If I told you how many emails are sitting in my inbox right now, it’s entirely possible your opinion of me may shake a bit. Some are news and health articles waiting to be read. Some have been answered but I’m not sure where to file them. A few await a response. I’m trying to get better at responding in a timely way.

Do you know what slows me down from answering emails right away? (Ok, not all, but some…the important ones.) Can you imagine what might be an obstacle to just putting those articles and answered emails in a file and being done with it? In a word…perfection.

Isn’t it interesting that we require something of ourselves that was never asked for?

• Moses didn’t know much about burning bushes when he turned toward it.
• Gideon’s response to God was a bit hostile at first, questioning second.
• Jeremiah questioned God’s thinking.
• Mary sought to understand the logistics.
• The Shepherds talked things over before deciding to go and see for themselves if the message received was real and true.

Nothing perfect here. Nothing prescribed. Just people responding out of who they are in that moment. And that didn’t stop them from going further.

I wonder how often we think that when our response to God is less than we would have hoped for, we’ve lost the chance to go further in that moment? And yet, it’s not our initial response that determines movement. It’s the willingness to “go and see”.

“Let’s get over to Bethlehem as fast as we can and see for ourselves what God has revealed to us.”

—Luke 2:16 (MSG)

“Let’s just go and see!” Everything starts with that! Can we follow the stirrings of curiosity into the mystery of what is being revealed without getting bogged down trying to do it right? Can we allow a spontaneous, clumsy response to the Spirit’s invitation to draw close to where Jesus is? Can we be ok with who we are in this moment when Jesus is calling and answer Him with what we have?

• Abram didn’t start out as Abraham.
• Moses took off his shoes when He realized where he was.
• Jeremiah needed God’s words put in his mouth.
• Mary trusted in a beautiful way.
• The Shepherds witnessed the birth of the Messiah.

This is the work of God. Taking us, how we are, where we are, and loving us into His more. More depth than we knew, more life than we thought, more capacity to follow, and more change than we thought we could endure.

All this from the invitation to “go and see.” I wonder what that might look like for you today?