The Rewards of Risk

⁹ But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

A few weeks ago, I shared I had auditioned for a musical. I went as an offering to God, to honor the person I believe He is creating in me; and to show I am willing to go when I feel the Holy Spirit nudge me along. This transformation will be a long process, because, as I have shared multiple times, currently music is a weakness of mine. My musical talents are anemic, as they have been starved by my fear of failure for so long.

It was a risk for me to go to the audition. It risked my pride, my dreams, and the little part of my soul which gets left on the stage whenever I sing for others.

My risk was rewarded, but maybe not how you think.

I was not cast in the musical. I did not amaze the director into giving this unknown the lead. I was rewarded in a different way. I received a call from the director who let me know they thought I did very well at the audition, but unfortunately, they were not able to cast me because they are keeping a small cast and they had some of their big players come out to audition for the show. This director is family friend and knows I have a talent and history in set design, so she asked me instead if I would be willing to do the props for the show. 

This is how amazing God is. 

I risked the dream; which in all honesty, would put me in a very strange a stressful position right now. As this would have been my first show in a very long time, I would have been open to all sorts of attacks about my worth and abilities. It would have been very easy for the dream to be turned into a nightmare by my own weakness. So instead of granting the dream, all right now, God has given me the first step. Set design is a strength of mine. It comes naturally to me and requires much less effort on my part than performing. It will require less of a time commitment, which is good because my life is gearing up to be very busy in the coming weeks. In this way, I get to introduce myself to these other theater artists not in my weakness, but in a strength.

Don’t misunderstand me, set design is not the goal and I have not lost sight of the dream. I am not settling in any way; I am moving forward with the understanding that it will all take time. My weaknesses will become my strengths when I wait in the power of Christ.

Continuing the adventure,

Jessi