How to Take Action When We Don't Feel Ready
- Boma
- Feb 5, 2024
- 9 min read
Sometimes even the most ordinary of words can be full of meaning and bring so much insight and understanding. We can think we know what something means but on closer examination, we find we have only scratched the surface. How much more can we find if we examine the Word of God!
The word ready is an everyday ordinary word. Children use it in games like hide and seek, calling, "Ready or not... Here I come!" We hear and use it often but there are several concepts wrapped up in this common and unassuming word.
Ready Means Prepared to Act or for Use
Being ready means being prepared for what is to come. We can revise to ensure we are ready to sit an exam. We can research a company to ensure we are ready for an interview. We can pack for the expected weather and activities of an upcoming holiday and we can train to be ready for a marathon. Being prepared can make us feel confident in our ability to adequately handle what we expect to come or even the unexpected.
When we say that dinner is ready we mean it has been prepared and perhaps plated up to be used for its intended purpose - consumption. The ingredients making up the meal have undergone every process necessary to make a dish that is ready for use according to its purpose.
Ready Means Available
Ready can also mean being available, in the sense of being free to be used because the person or thing is to hand or unoccupied. This availability could have come about intentionally or otherwise. A shopworker is expected to be ready (available) to serve even when there is no customer.
In Luke 10:25-37, Jesus contrasts three Jewish men whose hearts were not available to be used by God to help their fellow man with the Samaritan who made himself available to love his neighbour. Several of the disciples Jesus chose were occupied by their profession but made themselves available when Jesus called them to follow Him. Elisha made himself available when Elijah threw his mantle on him. Moses showed he was available when he turned aside from his stepfather's sheep to take a closer look at a burning bush. Each time someone in the Bible was available, God used them for His glory. It is therefore of critical importance that we make room in our lives for the things we are preparing for, even if we do not know what they are. How can we make room for something unknown?
Being ready (available) is closely linked with being willing. Therefore, we need to consider what we are willing to let go of for where are called to. This need not be a decision left for the moment of decision, rather we can be ready (prepared) to make this choice beforehand. We can do this by being deliberately conscious of our priorities in the short and long term and by intentionally managing our attachments to the things that take up our time. Otherwise, we may find ourselves giving up what we truly want for what we have right now.
Ephesians 3:20 says that God is able to do more than we can ask or imagine, so we also need to get comfortable being stretched beyond the limits of our hearts and minds. Whilst stretching may not be comfortable we can expect and accept that this is how God works and decide to partner with Him.
Ready Means Enthusiastic
We might hear someone say, "I am so ready for this season of my life to be over" or "I am so ready for my holiday next week". Neither statement indicates any preparation has taken place. The person yearning for a change in their circumstances may or may not have taken action to bring about or to prepare for the change. They may even be the reason the change has not come. The person eagerly awaiting the upcoming holiday may or may not have packed or booked the cat sitter or planned their route to the airport. In this sense, ready describes raring to go or filled with eager anticipation.
Ready: Prepared, Available and Enthusiastic
Not everyone in the Bible who was used by God was prepared, available and enthusiastic. For example, Moses made himself available to God when he turned aside to look at the bush that was on fire but not consumed. He was prepared in the palace to speak to Pharoah and prepared by the outdoor life and shepherding experience to lead the people of Israel to the Promise Land. Because he did not recognise this he was not enthusiastic about the prospect. His repeated protesting angered God, but God in His mercy said He would speak to Moses and Moses would speak to Aaron, and Aaron would speak to Pharoah (see Exodus chapter 3).
Jonah was called to deliver God's message of judgement to the Ninevites but made himself unavailable by attempting to run from the presence of God. He was less than enthusiastic about the prospect of God being merciful to those who turned to Him because the Ninevites were enemies of the Israelites.
David, however, is an example of someone prepared, available and enthusiastic. We see this in his response to Goliath's challenge to the Israelites in 1 Samuel 17:34-37. Notice that David's preparation came from his life experiences. Events that could be classed as challenges, even life-threatening ones, led him to approach his current situation with a foundation of trust in God's ability to work through him. This is the key to taking action when we don't feel ready. We must come to a place of trusting that God who has orchestrated the opportunity has made us ready (prepared) for Him to work through us. With this foundation, we have every reason to be ready (available) and ready (enthusiastic).
If we struggle to trust that God will see us through it can help to understand the purpose of preparation.
The Purpose of Preparation
To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven - Ecclesiastes 3:1 NKJV
The purpose of preparation is action, not inaction. Imagine someone telling you they were getting ready. You ask them what for and they reply, "Nothing". This would make no sense because we know that people are either getting ready for something specific or for something possible.
In times of war, soldiers are deployed according to their purpose. They are not asked how ready they feel about individual assignments because they have signed up to be used according to the purpose of their leaders. These leaders trust in the quality of the programme of preparation the soldiers have undergone and factor this into their strategy. When God tells us to do something, He has factored in our preparedness for His purpose because He knows the preparation we have gone through. He has the overall picture and a strategy for success in place. We can confidently put our trust in God rather than in our sense or understanding of readiness.
Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or understanding - Proverbs 3:5 AMPC
God is more interested in my availability than my sense of preparedness. Enthusiasm can wane and a sense of preparedness can be subjective, meaning that two individuals can consider themselves prepared for something whilst preparing very differently or with different degrees of diligence. Similarly, two individuals may be well prepared but only one considers themselves ready.
I once read a children's story similar to the fable of the hare and the tortoise. In this version, the tortoise prepared to race the hare by resting and the hare prepared by running everywhere he could in the days before the race, morning, noon and night. On the day of the race, the hare started very well and took an early lead. However, it was a long course and all his preparation meant he now grew tired. He determined that he had time for a quick nap confident the tortoise would not catch up to him. However, just like in the original version, the hare overslept and the tortoise made slow but steady progress past the sleeping hare and his misplaced confidence. When the hare finally awoke the tortoise was too far ahead to be caught and won the race. Both creatures felt they were preparing for the race effectively, but only one did. One lesson here is that how we feel about our preparation is an unreliable measure of our readiness for what lies ahead.
Beyond being a flawed measure of readiness, relying on our sense of preparedness can mask our propensity to procrastinate. Waiting to feel ready before taking action is procrastination. Like the tortoise, we should take purposeful and appropriate action even if that action is rest.
I emphasise the Blessing in Action because I firmly believe in the power of acting on what we learn. The blessing may not always be immediately evident. It may not even be tangible, but could be wisdom, character development or peace. Often these are earned and maintained through effort and discipline which may feel uncomfortable and not like a blessing at all!
To overcome the anxiety associated with not feeling ready we must live with purpose in mind. We must recognise and accept that preparation is part of the journey we take to get where we are going, not the destination. Everything we learn and experience in life is preparation for a future stage of our journey. In the Book of Proverbs, we see wisdom, knowledge and understanding can be obtained through both learning from instruction and experience. We are created to be lifelong learners who are diligent in learning through formal or informal study and from our experiences and those of others. The most important lessons we can learn are about who God is. We would do well to actively remember every time God reveals His love and His faithfulness to us through our lives and learning. This will cause us to trust Him.
None of our experiences are wasted. God factors our purpose into our journey. This not only means God takes the good, the bad and the ugly of our story and makes good out of them. It also means that God guides us through experiences necessary to make us ready for what is to come.
And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them - Romans 8:28 NLT
Jesus, Our Example
I used to wonder what Jesus did to prepare for His earthly ministry. I thought it would be good to know what He did for those 30 years. Now I see I do not need to know because it matters far less than His availability. When Jesus said, "not My will, but Yours, be done" (Luke 22:42) He was making the ultimate statement of readiness because true availability looks like setting aside our will for God's. In Jesus, we have a perfect blueprint for how to take action when we don't feel ready. If we examine His 3 years of ministry we will find that He lived His life in preparation for the most important yes in human history.
Jesus is called the Lamb who was slain before the world was formed (Revelation 13:8), because once God thought of humanity individually and collectively He loved us, and His faithfulness to love meant He would do all He could to make a way to have a personal relationship with us. If we believe this to be true and focus on Jesus daily our trust in Him will grow, helping us step out in obedience regardless of how we feel.
Jesus is the author and perfector of our faith (Hebrews 12:2), what He starts in us He will complete (Philippians 1:6), and it is His power that works in us (Ephesians 3:20; Philippians 2:13) to fulfil His good plans. As we meditate on His part and His power in our lives we can rejoice in the confident expectation that in and through Him we are ready as we need to be.
How to Take Action When We Don't Feel Ready
We can feel we are not ready if we base our judgement on our limited understanding and perspective and focus on who we think we are and our appraisal of our abilities and capacity. We may look at our history or present through murky lenses and struggle to see it for what it is - a training ground. God, on the other hand, is outside of time. He created and controls time so is not limited by it in any way. God is all-knowing and everywhere present. Who would you rather trust to determine whether you are ready?
When we trust God's ability to both guide and use our past, present and future experiences, we acknowledge that God is at work in all our ways (Proverbs 3:5-6). In so doing we can be confident that He will direct and is directing our lives with what He knows about our future in mind. This allows us to take action from a place of rest not anxiety as we trust in Him and not ourselves.
Blessing in Action: How to Take Action When We Don't Feel Ready
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