#351 - Doing Scary Things

Welcome to the Hannah Keeley Podcast. I'm Hannah Keeley, and today I want to help you do scary things. Because if you think about it, everything that you want and everything you desire, everything that you want to have happen in your life probably is on the other side of fear. Like, you have to get past the fear in order to accomplish anything. So really it's not about, you know, getting the right template and getting the right formula. All of the how is very important. But what's even more important is in than the how is getting into that place where we won't veer off the path. And that means we become comfortable doing scary things. And I want to show you why doing scary things is good. It really is good because of three reasons. And the first reason is because, just like I said, everything you want is on the other side of fear. If it wasn't scary, you would have already had it by now. If it didn't require more of you and make you, like, push the boundaries, you would already be there by now. So if you want it, you're gonna have to do something scary to get it. So that's the first reason. The second reason is doing scary things just makes you level up yourself. Like, you honestly do not know what is possible for you in your life. You just don't. Not until you start testing the boundaries and find out for yourself. Because in the Bible, God says that with God we can do impossible things, right? Nothing's impossible with God. So if nothing's impossible for God and God lives in us, that means nothing's impossible for us. But we'll never discover that if we stay safe. No success was made in safety. You have to get out of safety. You have to do scary things in order to level up yourself. But the third reason is I think one of the most important things is doing scary things. Lets God be God. Because God wants to show up in this world and he wants to show up through you. So that means if God wants to show up big in this world and he wants to use you to do it, that means he wants to do big things through you. So that means we're gonna have to let go of us being our source and us having it all figured out and us knowing the right thing and being able to yield to God in us. And that can feel scary. It can often feel kind of a little out of control. Sometimes it's like, no, I wanna manage everything. I gotta be in control. Maybe not maybe. Maybe it means saying yes before you feel ready. Maybe it means moving forward when you don't know where you're going. Like, it's just doing the scary thing. So it's good because of these three reasons. But I want to get practical today, and let's dive into how you do it. Like, we all know doing scary things is good, okay? We all want to face our fears, move past them, reach our goals. But how do we really do it? And I'm going to show you an example. In the Bible, someone who is extraordinarily afraid. But because he didn't let the fear determine his choices, he did some pretty radical things. And that's Gideon. And if you look in Judges 6, it says, and the angel of the Lord appeared to him, talking about Gideon, and said to him, the Lord is with you, you mighty man of fearless courage. So Gideon said to him, oh, sir, if the Lord is with us, why has all this befallen us? And where are all his wondrous works which our fathers told us, saying, did not the Lord bring us from Egypt, but now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of the Midianites. So here's the deal. God is saying, you are a mighty man, a fearless courage. I'm with you. And then he starts articulating all the reasons why he is not fearless. So what is he saying? All the things he's scared of. He's basically like, reciting his fear. He's like, okay, so first of all, the Lord's forsaken me because I, like, believed all these promises. Nothing's happening. The Lord's forsaken me, and he's given us into the hands of our enemies. Where are all the promises where all these wondrous works that we said were going to happen? He's not with me. He's forsaken me. This is his first thought. So don't tell me the Lord is with me. Obviously, he's not, because I don't feel it, and I'm not seeing any evidence of it in my life. And then the next verse, verse 14, the Lord turned to him and said, go in this your might, and you shall save Israel from the hand of Midian. Have I not sent you? So first he says, okay, God's with you. He's like, no, he's not. And then he says, now go in this your might, go in your courage. Because he called him mighty man. He called him courageous. So he says, go in this might that I've said you were. Go in the strength that I've already said you're strong and you'll save Israel. And Gideon said, oh Lord, how can I deliver Israel? Behold, my clan is the poorest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house. The Lord said to him, surely I will be with you. You will smite the Midianites as one man. So here he is reciting, here's why I feel forsaken. Here's why I don't believe that God's really with me. I'm not seeing any evidence. And here's why. I'm not strong, I'm not courageous, I'm not mighty. I am literally poverty stricken. I'm the poorest in my whole village. And oh, I'm also the youngest, right? I am the least in my father's house. I'm not only the poorest, I'm the least. So he is basically telling him, okay, you see this in me. I'm telling you what I see in me. And the two were not lining up. So whenever we are called to do scary things, God is going to reveal something in us that we don't yet see. We can agree with God or we can agree with our past, which says, nope, last time I checked, you're not strong, you're not courageous, you're not mighty, you're not enabled to do this. You're pretty much forsaken. God's not with you. Like, we'll have all the evidence. So we have to decide who we're going to believe. So how do we move forward? Understand this, this is number one. The reason you may be in a scary season right now is because God sees in you the fulfillment of your potential. You haven't gotten there yet, okay? You are just seeing where you are now. You're actually just seeing manifestation of your past right now. You're not seeing what God sees. So when you're in a scary season, what he's doing, he's calling you into the fulfillment of that potential. So this scary season may be the very best season because it's got to change your self perception. You cannot believe you're a loser. You can't believe you're forsaken. You can't believe you're weak and clueless and stupid and dumb and no resources and all the things you can't hold, hold onto that belief and accomplish the purpose for which you're here. You just can't do it. Because God is going to call you to do things outside of yourself, to do things beyond rational, your rational mind to do things without evidence of seeing that they're going to work. And that's very scary. So if this is a scary season of your life, then awesome. That means God sees something in you or he wouldn't be calling you into this. You're not just in this scary season to become the manifestation of your worst fear. You are in this scary season to prove what's possible. But that's going to require a change in how you see yourself. You cannot see yourself as limited if God is telling you to do something that is unlimited. You can't see yourself as unresourceful if God is leading you to become a resource for others. So in Romans 4:17, God talks about calling those things that are not as if they already were. That's what God does. He calls those things that are not as if they already were. Like he calls the future from the present. So we're also told that as he is, so are we in this world. So then what Our mandate becomes like what we see God do, we do. Jesus even said, unless I see my father do it, I'm not going to do it. Unless I hear my Father say it, I'm not going to say it. So we act accordingly. Jesus gave us. Gave us a template of what to do. So the way God is becomes the way we are. How he operates becomes the way we operate. So if he calls those things that are not as if they already are, if he calls the end from the beginning, then we have to do likewise. We have to change our vocabulary about where we are in the process of that scary season. We can't start reciting all the reasons why not. We can't start rehearsing our past. What we have to do is change the way we see ourselves. And that includes changing what we say about ourselves. Because you will never see it if you can't first say it. If you can't say I'm resourceful, if you can't say I'm brilliant, if you can't say I'm creative, if you can't say, say, everything works out for me. If you can't say God is fighting all my battles and I always come out victorious, then don't expect that reality in your life. I don't want you to stay in the scary season. There's a reason you're in the scary season, and it's so you can recreate who you are according to what God sees in you, which is so much bigger. He sees the fulfillment of the potential he poured in you. He poured in you power, authority, talent, skill. And he wants to see that come out in this world, come to manifestation in this world, that's how we take territory, is we allow what's in us to come out of us. But it will never feel safe. It will always feel a bit scary because it's going to make you again get a new version of your identity. You're going to have to push through some boundaries, and you're going to have to push through some fear. But don't think the fear is there to cause us to back up. That's what we normally do. We want to back up when we face fear. Fear is there to move forward. So that's why we can't wait until we feel fearless in order to do something. Courage is action in the face of fear, not in the absence of fear. It's in the face of fear. So what brings us into that next level version of ourselves is. Is the action we choose to take when we are most afraid to take it. If you move forward, you're stepping into a new reality, the next version of you. So the first thing right there is that that's why you're in the scary season. So don't, like, pull away from it. Walk into it knowing it's gonna lead you to somewhere amazing. And the second thing is don't confuse forsaken with frightened. Okay. Gideon said okay. You're saying the Lord is with me. I know he's not. He. Where's all the promises? Where are all the wondrous works? Where's all the evidence of him being with me? Here we are. We're like. We're starving, we're enslaved, we're captive. I'm not seeing anything. He was looking at all of his surroundings and all of the evidence to create a feeling like he was supported. But we can't wait again. We can't wait to feel fearless, to move forward. We can't wait to feel supported, to know we're safe. So that feeling like God has forsaken me. What if that's just you being frightened? What about if that's just you? I just haven't seen it yet. Like, sometimes scary feels like you're alone. Sometimes scary can feel very final. Scary can feel like you're unsupported. But what if it has to? Because if you felt safe and if you felt supported and if you felt that it was just temporary, you probably wouldn't take the boldest action. But if you can decide, you know what? I don't have to feel. I'm not going to let feelings dictate what I'm going to do, because I get to choose my they're my feelings. I will take authority over my feelings. And if I don't feel supported, you know what? I'm just going to tell myself I still am. Because God cannot forsake me. God cannot forsake his covenant. He cannot deny his covenant. So he's with me. Even though I see no evidence of it, I know he cannot abandon me. He will never abandon me or forsake me. So if I don't feel safe, I'm just going to tell myself I still am safe because he surrounds me in favor. He hems me in. He is my. My shield. He is my fortress, even when I don't feel like it. That's what faith is like. That's why we. That's why we live by, by. By faith. That's who we are. We don't. We don't. We don't walk by sight. We don't need to see it to believe it. If you did, you would. That would exhibit no faith. And we have to become a giant in faith before we can show up as a giant. And in any other place in this life. It's a faith walk. It's how we live. So that faith has to look like I don't have to feel supported or even have the evidence that I'm supported or feel safe to move forward. I can move forward right now. So I want you to check this out in Romans 4. I'm just going to read Romans 4, 20, 22. Actually, no, I'm not going to read that yet. That's just something different. I want to go back to that feeling of forsaken, because there's something I want to share with you. Sometimes when we feel forsaken, it's actually a process of being fine tuned. Okay. And think about, like, if you were a piano. I know that's kind of stretching it a bit, but if you were a piano and you were out of tune, someone who was a master at hitting pitch would have to come in and be able to stretch those strings on that piano so you could hit the right notes so you could be tuned. So being fine tuned also feels like you're being stretched. So we don't have to call it forsaken. We don't have to become so dramatic about this that the piano is not there saying, oh, I've been forsaken. No, you're being fine tuned. Okay? You're just being stretched a bit so that now you can exhibit more of his glory. Like we all want to be live in the manifestation of his goodness of his glory. Of his abundance, of his freedom. But we can't sing that song in a beautiful way if we're not tuned to hit pitch. Like, we've got to be tuned to do it. And that pain of doing scary things is the stretching. It's the fine tuning. It's the preparation. So we all want to run the marathon, but we have to understand, like, the marathon means that we train several times a week. We all want to hit the physical goal, right, of, like, to become lean and trim and strong and muscular. But that means we show up at the gym every day. We always. We want to hit the financial goals, but that means that sometimes we're working the 5 to 9 instead of the 9 to 5. So if. If we want it, if we really can see that it can happen. And God has given us this vision. It's going to require more of us. It's going to require attuning a stretching. And we're here for all of it. That's what you have to understand. We're not here to feel safe. We're here to show what's possible. So that is the second thing. And the third thing is so powerful. And I'm going to leave you with this. All you need to do in order to do scary things, all you need to do is to be willing and obedient. And you can do that. It says in Isaiah 1:19, if you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good of the land. Now, here's what we have a tendency to think. We have a tendency to think, I have to be willing and able, right? Okay, I'm willing and able. No, he didn't ask you to be able to do anything. He just said to be willing and obedient. So, God, we don't have to have the ability. We don't have to be able to do it. We don't have to have the resources. Just like Gideon, he's like, look, I am the least in my clan. I am the poorest. I've been forsaken. I have all the reasons why it can't happen. Okay? He's not coming to you to do and telling you to do this impossible thing because he thinks you're ready and you have the ability and you have the strength and the power and the courage. No, he's coming to you because he wants to be proven through you. So that means all we need to do, our biggest task, is just to say yes and then take the next step in obedience. That's all he's requiring. He never gives us like he never presents us with a bill we can afford. He always presents us with a bill. We're like, I don't have that in my account. He's like, right, that's because I'm all sufficient for you. God wants to show up sufficient for you. He wants to show up strong for you. But we have to be the one taking the next step. So Romans 4, 20, 22. This is no unbelief. This is talking about Abraham. No unbelief or distrust made him waver. Doubtingly question concerning the promise of God. But he grew strong and was empowered by faith as he gave praise and glory to God. So he here's Abraham not even seeing evidence. Okay? He didn't doubt concerning the promise. Even though he wasn't seeing the fulfillment for years and years and years and years, he didn't doubt. What he did was he made his faith continue to grow strong by praising God. I'm telling you, if you would just, like, step back from, how do I do this? And step into worship and praise. That's going to be your victory. I promise you. That's going to be your victory. It says here about Abraham, fully satisfied and assured that God was able and mighty. I want you to get those two words, able and mighty. So God was able and mighty to keep his word and to do what he had promised. We tend to think when we're facing scary things. We tend to think we have to be able and mighty. But he's not saying that. He says, no, you be willing and obedient, and I'll be able and mighty. So get your eyes off of your resources and put your eyes back on the source, which is God, who says, I'm able and mighty. But Abraham had to believe that about God. So he couldn't look in himself and say, okay, what is Abel and me? What is mighty in me? Because there wasn't anything. It said. He built up his faith knowing. Knowing that you know that you know that you know that God will not forsake his promise. He will not forsake me. And he's able and he's mighty to keep his word. It says here in verse 22, that is why his faith was credited to him as righteousness. Right? Standing with God. So stop looking at what you can do and fix your eyes on. On God, the author and finisher of your faith. He started it. He'll finish it. It's not like God started something in you, and now he's. Now he's like, hands off. Okay? Figure it out, sweetheart. Go for it. No, because we're predominantly clueless the majority of the time, right? Especially when you're talking about doing something that we're unfamiliar with. Especially when you're talking about doing something impossible. Like, God never leads us to something where we're like, yeah, I can see that happening in my life. Sure, I'll do it. No, he leads us to this mountain that we're like, what? I'm sorry, there is nothing in me that can climb that mountain. He's like, good, now we're on the same page. Because I didn't get you because you were such a great mountain climber. I got you because you were willing and obedient. I am able and mighty. I can climb that mountain if you'll just let me take over. You just be obedient. You just do the next thing I tell you to do, and before you know it, by my supernatural power, you're going to be standing at the top of that mountain and it's going to be the most fabulous view. So if you are in a scary season, I want to leave you with this. This is Hebrews 12, verse 2. Look away from all that will distract. That means look away from your own power, authority, ability, your own clever ideas, right? Looking away from all that will distract. To Jesus, who is the leader and the source of our faith, giving the first incentive for our belief and also its finisher, bringing it to maturity and perfection. He began something in you, and that's why it feels scary right now, because he began it in you and he's not relying on you to finish it. He's like, I began it in you. I can finish it. It's going to look a little scary in the middle, but keep looking to him. He's got everything you need. He is able, he is mighty. You just keep being willing and obedient. And guess what? You're going to do this scary thing. You're going to do this impossible thing. You're going to make it through the season because that's who you are and that's whose you are. I love you, friend. Be blessed like crazy.