This past week I had an amazing opportunity to speak at a mom's faith-based event. Speaking isn’t new to me in this era of my life. Over the last 5 years, I’ve gone from shaking just doing a live video on my newsfeed to hosting calls for thousands of individuals.
With the nature of the world, pretty much all of these are on Zoom. Now you can throw me on a screen with 4,000+ pretty amazing humans and I can give you my heart and only break a minor sweat ;) .
Yet, there is something different about actually standing in front of people. It’s almost like I’m back at square one again. I got a little shaky before I started-but this time I choose to see that as excitement instead of nervousness (If you don’t know being excited and anxious causes the same physical response in your body).
It took a few minutes to get into my routine, but the more I dove into the words I felt in my heart, the more my body relaxed. Was it perfect? Heck no, no speech I ever give will be perfect. But it was me showing up and saying yes to a calling God put in front of me.
So maybe God is putting something on your heart that is out of your comfort zone. Let me remind you that IT IS OKAY TO BE A BEGINNER again. Speaking and sharing faith-based content isn’t anything I had ever dreamed I’d be doing, but God put it in my heart. He has been nudging me to share more and he placed this opportunity in front of me. One of the really cool things about Jesus is he doesn’t want you to be perfect. In fact, he encourages messy action.
“My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.” -2 Corinthians 12.
When we aren’t at our best and even on the days where we completely miss the mark, God has the chance to get all of the glory. It wasn’t my strength that ever launched me into speaking-it was his. My prayer is that his voice came through and spoke to the heart of one of the women there.
In the moments where you are about to do something big and you feel anxious (or overly excited about it)—remember this verse:
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:6-7
God doesn’t tell us to be anxious when something crazy is about to happen in life. He says be anxious about NOTHING. Because when you are fully living with God, you have nothing to be worried about. He is the only one who has been in your tomorrow and he knows what he’s doing.
So try this: the next time you are feeling anxious-use that signal in your body as a sign to pray. Close your eyes, take a deep breath, literally just say: “God I feel anxious about _____________. I’m offering this up to you.” Then see what happens!!
Go move mountains today my friend! You are doing amazing things!