Goodbye Comfort Zone . . .

Wikipedia defines a comfort zone as a psychological state in which things feel familiar to a person and they are at ease and in control of their environment, experiencing low levels of anxiety and stress.

Well that describes the past eighteen months to a T?!

Of course, for many people life can never be described as a comfort zone. In fact it is maybe an insensitive image to evoke in the light of current horrifying and tragic events in Afghanistan. The reality is that life has always been far from comfortable for many many people.

But equally for many of us the truth is that we were probably living in a relative comfort zone before the arrival of Covid, and all that has changed in the past year and a half. But can discomfort be a gift? Maybe it is the wake up call that we need to encourage us to invest in new relationships outside our own narrow world, to realise afresh our collective responsibilities for our fellow human beings. Maybe, as we are now perhaps aware as never before of the challenges life throws up - ill health, loss, loneliness, fear, financial hardship and mental health issues to name but a few, we can find new and fresh ways to embrace our own vulnerabilities and to share with others how knowing and receiving the love and forgiveness and friendship of Christ is the only way to safely navigate this frighteningly unpredictable world.

Jesus’ friend John wrote that if I claim to be a follower of Jesus Christ I must live as Jesus lived. That’s a tall order, and one that will for sure require that I move out of my comfort zone, that I change, even as the world I live in continues to change.

Change is a concept with which many Christians have a difficult relationship. We talk about being totally changed when we surrender our lives to Christ, and on an eternal level that is a spiritual reality. I am changed, I am not the same person I was, and yet the reality is that in many ways my unredeemed, ego-centric self remains unchanged, and likes it that way! Like Paul “I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing” (Romans 7:18-19). The answer for me, as it was for Paul, is to look to Jesus, who alone has the power to help me want to change, and to change me. I can’t be fully the person I want to be . . but Jesus can help me towards becoming that person, if I let him.

I was thinking about the meeting in the synagogue between Jesus and the man with a shrivelled hand. We’re not told that he approached Jesus, he was probably used to hiding in the shadows, ashamed of his disability, but Jesus saw him and told him to stand out in front of everyone - how scary must that have been for him. None of us is comfortable with revealing our weaknesses, even, or maybe especially in the church, where we anticipate censure more often than grace. How many of us feel obliged to leave our problems at the door, afraid to reveal our spiritual shortcomings, Sunday smiles concealing the truth that we are dying inside and longing for someone to truly know us and love us as we really are? Our tragedy is that Jesus does know and love us this way, but we may never know - unless Christ’s followers are prepared to step out of their religious comfort zone and embody his love and grace.

Jesus asks the man to go further and to stretch out his hand - something he cannot do - but in his moment of trust and surrender Jesus heals him.

As Henri Nouwen points out, all of us are part of “the fellowship of the weak that is the human family”. We all have frailties, fears and anxieties that we cannot deal with alone; with Jesus we can - if we will only let him.

The contrast between the man Jesus healed and the religious leaders is stark. Mark describes in his Gospel how their focus was so fixed on their own agenda that they were incapable of recognising the needs of a fellow human being. Instead their priority was to catch Jesus out. His act of compassion was an opportunity for them to rid themselves of this man who threatened to disrupt their comfort zone. Jesus knew their motives, so he nailed them with this question . . . “‘What kind of action suits the sabbath best? Doing good or doing evil? Helping people or leaving them helpless?’ No one said a word. He looked them in the eye, one after another, angry now, furious at their hard-nosed religion” (Mark 3:4-5 Message).

We would never be guilty of hard nosed religion would we? Never refuse to leave the comfort zone of our own preferences, to rethink the theological positions we cling to in the conviction that we are right and everyone else is wrong? Never ignore our own failings, blind to the truth that we need healing every bit as much as everyone else?

The church is sadly full of countless people who claim that they have faithfully served the Lord for decades, and yet remain unchanged, just as embittered, angry, intolerant and controlling as the day they supposedly surrendered their lives to Christ. I have pastored churches where it would have been less contentious to preach a dodgy message than to suggest replacing the pews with comfortable chairs, where elders only gave their assent to a woman’s appointment in the belief that with a female minister in place their patriarchal power base would remain intact.

Change is too often for Christians the challenge we resist at all costs. ‘It will be so good to get back to normal once the pandemic is over’. Maybe the Lord has more for me, for his church, than ‘getting back to normal’. If Jesus was angry with the religious leaders for abusing their authority and disregarding the needs and value of others, I wonder sometimes what he thinks of me when I try to stay within my Christian comfort zone - read my Bible, say my prayers, don’t colour outside of the lines, keep my life neat, tidy and safe. As I understand it, following Jesus was never meant to be neat, tidy and safe.

I don’t know what it will mean for me, for Christ’s church, to live in this changed post-Covid world. I do know that the only way to live for Christ is to reach out my hand, take hold of his, step out of my comfort zone and go where he leads.

“We are called to give our lives to others, so you and I can bear fruit. And all brokenness, and all dying, and all suffering is there to allow you to enter into solidarity with the whole human family, and to give yourselves to others so that your life can bear fruit. God asks you not to have a successful life but to have a fruitful life.”

Henri Nouwen