Whatever the Adventure Is

Whatever the Adventure Is--December 22, 2017

"The angel said to [Mary], 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.' Then Mary said, 'Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.' Then the angel departed from her." [Luke 1:35-38]

If there is one thing that has stuck with me from my brief childhood adventures in Cub Scouting, years and years ago, it was the Boy Scout motto: Be prepared.  

As a kid, I think it first struck me that the motto was rather vague.  Pre-teen me would have asked incredulously, "What are we supposed to be prepared for?"  And sure, some specifics would give a little more direction as to what to pack, and what to have ready.  After all, you prepare for a quick trip to the store differently than you pack for a move across the ocean to a new country, and you prepare for a one-night dinner party differently than you would for the birth of a child into your family.  I think that the younger version of myself just shrugged off the wisdom of the Scout motto because I thought it was too broad to give any particular direction to my life.

But the more I let those two words roll around in my brain, and perhaps just the more I live life, the more I think there is a certain wisdom in the broad advice to "Be prepared," precisely because it is so open-ended.  And that's because I now take it to mean, "If you are going to live this life well and rightly, you need to be ready for whatever direction it may take you.  Be ready for whatever the adventure is."

That, of course, fits well with what Scouting is supposed to be about, I would think.  Since you don't know what you'll need if you go out into the woods alone, for example, you'd be well-served to have skills for survival, cooking over a fire, navigating strange terrain, and making yourself a shelter.  You might not need all of those skills on any one given day, but you might just need any one of them.  So it's best to be prepared for whatever the adventure might throw at you, knowing that you'll never quite know what you have gotten yourself into until you are into it.  

I think much the same these days about Mary's response to the angel in this scene from Luke.  Mary's response is so broad and sweeping that at first, my immature soul wants to laugh at how much Mary is getting herself into.  "Here am I, the servant of the Lord," she says, "Let it be just as you say."  That sounds rather like saying, "Whatever you say, Angel--I'll be ready."  Part of me wants to warn the young girl: "Mary, Mary, Mary, you are writing a blank check here--if you tell God that you are willing to do whatever God says to you, you should expect that God is gonna require something big of you!"  It strikes my ears like "be prepared"--as something so broad, so open-ended, that you can't ever exactly picture what it would look like to really do it.  Either way, you don't know what tools to bring--will we need a screwdriver for today's mission... or a blow torch?  A Bible... or a copy of the Twelve Step Big Book?  A car for going to visit someone who is sick and in the hospital?  A pick-up truck for helping move a formerly homeless family into their new place?  A plane ticket to fly across the globe to join in mission or relief work?  Part of the adventure is knowing that it could be anything.

And that's just it--with the God who calls us, we really are on the adventure of a lifetime.  To follow Jesus, to prepare for this One we are convinced is worth waiting for, is to say "Yes" to a life that you won't fully see or predict until you are already knee-deep into it.  It is to say, "Yes," even when it comes with surprises... or sends you into the midst of situations outside your comfort zone... or sends you to people you did not think you would ever meet.  It is to say, like Mary, "I'll be ready for anything, so I'll travel light."

I can't possibly guess what the living God has in mind to do with your gifts, your time, your passion, your restlessness, your servant's heart, your love, and your resources.  But I am convinced, as someone daily challenged by Mary's response, too, that it will be worth it.  It may well be that the best way to actually prepare for Jesus is to be ready for anything, just like the Boy Scout motto.  

So, today, let's allow that to be our prayer, and let us dare to hope that will be enough.  However and wherever and for whatever you call us, God, we will dare to say, "Here I am, the servant of the Lord.  I'm prepared... whatever the adventure is."

Here we are, Lord God, your servants.  Lead us on this adventure following after Jesus.