Today, we are closing out our series called “Chase the Lion.” And “Chase the Lion” has been all about answering the question “What if the life you really want and the future god wants for you are hiding right now in your biggest problem, your worst failure … your greatest fear?” God wants to use those challenges in your life, and he doesn’t want you to back down from them.
Today, we are going to look at the last characteristic of being a lion-chaser, and that is looking foolish. Each week we have been looking at the same story from the Bible through these seven different lenses: defying odds, facing your fears, overcoming adversity, embracing uncertainty, taking risks, seizing opportunities, and now looking foolish. This all comes from 2 Sam. 23:20-23:
“There was also Benaiah son of Jehoiada, a valiant warrior from Kabzeel. He did many heroic deeds, which included killing two of Moab's mightiest warriors. Another time he chased a lion down into a pit. Then, despite the snow and slippery ground, he caught the lion and killed it. Another time, armed only with a club, he killed a great Egyptian warrior who was armed with a spear. Benaiah wrenched the spear from the Egyptian's hand and killed him with it.”
Benaiah was one of David’s mighty men, his elite forces. There are three instances recorded in 2 Samuel 23 about Benaiah’s life. He faced off against two mighty Moabite warriors, he took on a giant Egyptian who had a spear with only a club, and one snowy day, he chased a lion into a pit and killed it. And as a result of all those feats of strength and courage and daring, he eventually becomes captain of David’s bodyguard, and eventually commander of all the army of Israel.
But I want you to imagine, what if Benaiah had encountered the lion, chased the lion, the lion falls in a pit, Benaiah jumps in after him, and the lion kills him. What would everybody have thought? Would he have been remembered as a valiant warrior? Would he have been considered a mighty man? No. He would have been thought a fool. His tombstone would have said, “Here lies Benaiah, a complete idiot.”
But, you know, I believe deep down inside every follower of Jesus Christ, there is a primal desire to do something crazy for God. We want to chase a lion like Benaiah. But our fear of looking foolish keeps us from attempting some amazing things for God.
Poll after poll shows that most people’s number one fear is the fear of speaking in public. Death ranks number two. That means there are a lot of people who would rather die than speak in public. Why? It’s the fear of looking foolish.
But, the willingness to look foolish is one of the key facets of faith. Throughout history, the people who God uses most are the people who are willing to look the most foolish. Noah looked foolish building a giant boat in the middle of the desert where it had never rained and nobody even knew what rain was. Sarah looked foolish buying maternity clothes when she was 90 years old. The Israelites looked foolish when they laid siege to the fortified city of Jericho by marching around it and blowing on trumpets. David looked foolish as a teenage boy attacking a giant with a sling shot and a stone. Benaiah looked foolish chasing a lion. The wise men looked foolish following a star for thousands of miles to find a baby. Peter looked foolish stepping out of a boat in the middle of a lake. And Jesus looked foolish hanging half-naked on a cross dying for the very people who were executing him.
But Noah was saved from the flood. Sarah gave birth to Isaac. The walls of Jericho came crashing down. David killed Goliath. Benaiah killed the lion. The wise men found the Messiah. Peter walked on water. And Jesus rose from the dead. Do you know why so many of us haven’t killed a giant or walked on water or seen the walls come tumbling down? Because we aren’t willing to look foolish.
Now, today, I want to show you two hindrances that you have to let go of to be able to embrace looking foolish for God, or how to look foolish. Now, look, it’s easy to look foolish. Literally, any idiot can look foolish. The key is, being willing to look foolish for God so that you can embrace the life God has for you. You see, following God’s purpose and plan and God’s will for your life will often look foolish to other people. Look at what 1 Corinthians 1:27 says, “God deliberately chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise.” God delights in using things that look foolish from a human perspective, because when he does amazing things through foolish things, two things happen: he gets the glory, and human wisdom gets confounded.
So, let’s take a look at how to look foolish, two hindrances to you being willing to look foolish for God. First, you have to let go of the need to conform. The need to fit in, the need to be like everybody else, the need to do what everybody else is doing, the need to go with the flow, to follow the crowd. The refusal to stand out from the crowd. We are often hindered from our ability to chase lions that God puts in our path and embrace the life that God has for us, because we don’t want to be different. We don’t want to stand out from the crowd.
The essence of Jesus’ teaching here on earth is the Sermon on the Mount, this sermon Jesus preached one day on a hillside by the Sea of Galilee. And, kind of the theme verse for the sermon on the mount is Mt. 6:8: “Do not be like them.” Jesus wants us to be non-conformists. Don’t do what everybody else is doing just because everybody else is doing it. Don’t think or act or be like everybody else.
There’s this thing educators call divergent thinking. And divergent thinking is intellectual originality. It is creativity and counterintuitive thought. It is creative thinking. It’s seeing things from a different perspective, doing things your own way. Between the ages of three and five, ninety-eight percent of children score in genius category for divergent thinking. Between the ages of eight and ten, the percentage drops to thirty-two percent. By the time they are teenagers it drops to ten percent, and after age twenty-five, only two percent of us score in the genius category for divergent thinking. Gradually, we are taught and pressured and trained to be like everybody else and think like everybody else and act like everybody else.
But I think divergent thinking, divergent spirituality is one of the keys to spiritual maturity. Rom. 12:2 says, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” We are supposed to proactively resist conforming. And not just that, we are supposed to be transformed, continually being reshaped and refashioned. And, we are supposed to be tranformers ("more than meets the eye"). We are supposed to actively bring about transformation in the world around us.
Somewhere along the way, I think we may have missed the point. Christians are supposed to be non-conformists. Yet, somehow, Christians have become the most conforming group in our society. We look the same, act the same, talk the same, vote the same. We are the most conservative people in our nation. But we are supposed to be the change agents. We should be dangerous to be around.
Hello, have you read the Bible? God tells Ezekiel to cook his food over dung for a year. He tells Hosea to marry a prostitute. He speaks to Balaam through a donkey. One time, just for kicks, he afflicts the Philistines with a plague of hemorrhoids. His Son was born in a barn. None of that is normal. But here’s what I’ve learned. There’s no such thing as normal. As soon as we get over our need to conform to whatever normal is, we will be much freer to do what God has called us to do with our lives.
Look at John 8:36: “So if the Son makes you free, you will be truly free.” As Christians, we should be the freest people in the world to be the person God has called us to be. To stop trying to be like everybody else, and be the person God has called us to be. I believe Christians should be the most creative people in the world. I believe we should be the best artists, the best musicians, the best writers, the best scientists, the best thinkers the world has ever known, because we are free to be who we really are. When you have experienced the freedom that comes from knowing Christ, then you don’t worry about looking foolish.
Then, the second thing you have to do to look foolish is let go of pride. You see, another reason we are afraid to look foolish is because we are afraid of what other people will think of us. We have to let go of the need to be cool, the need to be accepted, the need to be popular. We have to let go of ego, let go of self. When you are more worried about your self-image than pleasing God, you can’t be used by God. In fact, when you begin to exalt yourself over God in your life, it won’t be long before God does something to humble you. “God sets himself against the proud, but he shows favor to the humble” (James 4:6). When you try to protect your own ego at the expense of what God wants you to do, in other words, when you aren’t willing to look foolish for God, you cut yourself off from being used by God in a significant way.
One of my favorite stories in the Bible is when David brought the ark of the covenant back to Jerusalem. The ark was this gold-covered box that represented God’s presence among his people. It had originally lived in the tabernacle, the place of worship for people in the Old Testament. But it had been hidden away for the last hundred years. So, David decides to bring it back to Jerusalem, and has some trouble along the way getting it there. Finally, he gets the ark to Jerusalem. And the Bible says that as the ark is entering the city, that David leads the procession and he strips down to his underoos and dances before the Lord with all his might. Well, his wife, Michal is watching, and when David walks through the door, she says, dripping with sarcasm, “How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, disrobing in the sight of the slave girls.” And I love David’s response.
“David retorted to Michal, ‘I was dancing before the LORD, who chose me above your father and his family! [Just a little dig there.] He appointed me as the leader of Israel, the people of the LORD. So I am willing to act like a fool in order to show my joy in the LORD. Yes, and I am willing to look even more foolish than this.” 2 Samuel 6:21-22
David didn’t care what Michal or anybody else thought. He was willing to put his pride on the line to totally give himself in worship of the Lord. He says, you think I acted like a fool today. Well, I was doing it all for the Lord, and when it comes to what I’m willing to do to show my love for the Lord, you ain’t seen nothing yet. I’ll become even more foolish than this. That’s the kind of life God uses, people who are willing to lay it all on the line for God. Look at what Jesus says about following him, Matthew 16:25: “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.”
The fear of foolishness paralyzes us in life. I can’t share my faith—I might look foolish. I can’t pray for a miracle—I might look foolish. I can’t get involved in a ministry—I might look foolish. I can’t seek out counseling—I might look foolish. I can’t change majors—I might look foolish. I can’t quit my job—I might look foolish. I can’t ask them out on a date—I might look foolish. I can’t raise my hand—I might look foolish. I can’t be baptized in front of everybody—I might look foolish.
But if you will be willing to look foolish for God, if you will embrace the incredible life God has for you, you just might find that there is some amazing stuff God wants to do in your life. Look at 1 Corinthians 1:25: “This ‘foolish’ plan of God is far wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God's weakness is far stronger than the greatest of human strength.”
So, what lion is God calling you to chase? Let me give you a lion chaser’s manifesto: Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Grab life by the mane. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences. Enjoy the journey. Find every excuse you can to celebrate everything you can. Don’t let what’s wrong with you keep you from worshipping what’s right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze a new trail. Criticize by creating. Worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks. Don’t try to be who you’re not. Be yourself. Laugh at your-self. Quit holding out. Quit holding back. Quit running away. Chase the lion!
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