We have a very cute pair of guinea pigs called Ginger and Tufty. We recently moved them into their new accomodation which is a rather smart apartment with a grassy area underneath in which they can graze and generally poddle about. Upstairs is their bedroom with warm shavings and straw and of course their food. I should imagine it is bliss for a guinea pig...

BUT, do they ever look beyond the enclosure at the garden beyond and wonder what it would be like to be out there? It must be hard to see the sunny part of the garden when you are stuck in the shady bit, or eye up that lovely bunch of dandelions which are just out of reach. They don't know what it is like not having to rely on me to move them to pastures new or on my choice of food for them. They don't know anything else but our garden. It could get very boring...if they ever thought about it.

Being outside their comfort zone would have its negatives of course. They may be eaten by a fox or injured by a cat! If they managed to find somewhere safe as a bed, they wouldn't be as warm and cosy as they are in the hutch. (No nice warm straw there.) The would have to be totally independent for food and shelter, foraging for what they could get and accepting the unfamiliar.

So why am I musing about all this? It struck me that Christians can be in either position. We can get comfortable in our churches, in the activities which we enjoy and are good at, in the friendship groups we are used to. We can be passive and reliant on the leadership to tell us where and why..poddling about as we have always done. Or we can hear God's call out of the comfort of the enclosure and go where things may not be as familiar; where it may be more dangerous and less reliable and comfortable. Daunting huh? The upside it that God may have the spiritual equivalent of a bunch of dandelions waiting for us, which would have always been out of reach before. We may be able to bask in patches of sunshine at the far end of the garden. We may even visit entirely new gardens never seen before in which there may be lettuces and tomatoes or even more guinea pigs... who knows?

Only those who step out of the comfort zone get to find out! Are you prepared to?