DEVOTION / Beyond our comfort zone

When I graduated from the seminary my only living grandmother, Grandma Adams, made, what was for her, a long and somewhat frightening trip from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to Milwaukee.

Out of her comfort zone

It was a trip she had made less than a handful of times in her 80 years. She was comfortable on her farm and in her garden, but uncomfortable in the big city. Still she made the trip to see her grandson finish his seminary career.

Love compels us to move out of our comfort zone so we can offer comfort to others. Or congratulate them. Or encourage them.

Out of his comfort zone

No one ever moved farther out of his comfort zone than the Son of God. He left behind the joys, the pleasures, the perfection of heaven to live in a world that offered only the opposite.

In place of honor, he embraced shame. In place of praise, he accepted ridicule. In place of heaven's peace, he opened himself to hell's torture. "You know," Paul reminds us, "the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich" (2 Corinthians 8:9).

The Son of God subjected himself to unimaginable loss so he could share his riches with us. So all that is his could become ours. Because God became poor, we have the riches of his holiness, his grace, his heaven.

Out of our comfort zone

I'll have to wait until I meet her in heaven to tell Grandma again how much I appreciated her journey to my seminary graduation. I can live out my appreciation for Jesus every day. I can move out of my comfort zone to love others as Jesus has loved me.