Prompting Creation 4: Overcoming the Fear Inside

Have you ever spoken up when you saw something going on that was wrong? Were you scared? What ended up happening?

Yes, yes, depended on the situation.

I like to think that I am a principled person with a deep well of courage. Some days it is easy to think that, and others it is near impossible. Too often I have kept my mouth shut when I should have opened it, sometimes to not anger someone, sometimes to not hurt someone, but usually it is because I choose fear instead of courage. But, there have been times when I have spoken up for what I believe in and against what someone else believes, the following is one example.

The first situation happened 17 years ago, give or take a month or two. I was working at AU for the summer, working with various groups that stayed on the university grounds for their various camps and conferences. I applied for the job merely to keep from going back to West Virginia for the summer, but it turned out that I really enjoyed it and was pretty good at it, both so much so that I cam back for 2 more summers. The summer had been moving along just fine, we had some staff hiccups, but by and large we got along pretty well, but about half way through the summer one of our staff was a bit overwhelmed by all they had to do and they asked for help. This staff member was one who would always step in to help if one of us had a camp and they did not, but during this particular staff meeting when they asked for help I was the only one who volunteered. While I did have a camp on campus at the time it was a pretty easy workload and I had the time to help, but so did several other of my coworkers. For whatever reasons, some known and some unknown to me, my coworkers were unwilling to help. I sat quite for awhile, getting angry and my heart started beating really fast, while this was happening my coworker started to cry and got up and left. Once she was out of the room I kind of exploded at everyone else. Talking about who helpful the coworker had been to each one of them, and talking about their selfishness in not helping in return. At that point I had to leave the meeting in order to help my camp director with something. Later on I went back to the office to talk to my superior and to apologize for my explosion. She ended up thanking me for doing it. She told me that after I left they all signed up to help with the various things that my coworker needed. She went on to tell me that if it had come from her they might not have reacted the way they did, but since it was me, someone who was usually quiet and reserved, it made more of an impact.

Peace and Love,
Pastor K