Is it Time for You to Level Up?

"If I can just get this one thing done, or if I can just get passed this one difficult area, or if I can just achieve this area of success, everything will just level out and be easier and life will be smooth sailing…"

Have you ever thought that? I have. A lot.

Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. The truth is, everything we do today is preparing us for a harder tomorrow.

I mean, it starts the moment we are born! We spend the first year learning how to do more, be more independent and become more mobile. We enter the world learning and yearning to reach the next level: infancy to childhood, childhood to adolescence, adolescence to adulthood, and on and on.

Can you imagine if a three year old decided they had reached their potential because they could feed themselves and go potty on their own and walk and talk? And so they decided they were done doing more or learning any new harder things.

It’s ridiculous and sad to even think about that!

But that’s really how grown-up people think a lot! When we adopt that type of thinking we are really saying that we want to stop growing, that we want to level out. And that’s not God’s goal. God is constantly pushing us to grow, and to change.

God isn’t yearning for us to level out...he’s yearning for us to level up, and get closer to Him.

He wants us to learn those better things because it’s better for us!

I have witnessed this in my own life is some big ways in recent years. Those ways were never easy. I have referred to them sometimes as growth spurts, or growing pains. It’s like that same three year old toddler cutting new teeth... Anyone who has ever had a teething baby knows that the process is not a happy one. It’s uncomfortable for them and painful at times and they get whiny and don’t sleep good and they slobber SO MUCH.

It’s messy and painful.

But the end result is a toddler who can now consume bigger and harder foods. They leveled up from soft mushy food and baby milk to the more mature stuff that their growing body needed in order to thrive.

Friend, that’s what God is always working in our lives. He desires for us to grow up, level up, in our faith and become more and more like Him. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 13:11, “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

We were not created to stay, or live, in a lower level.

It can also be compared to a video game. The gamer’s goal is to get to the next level, to gain helpful tools and power along the way that will assist them in that next level, and to ultimately reach the finish line. Who plays a video game just to replay the same level over and over again?

No one.

We were made to level up. And in each level of life God provides tools and fuel and friends that can help us complete that level and assist us in the next level and give us fuel to keep going.

If you are in a hard level in your life right now that is so challenging and feels like it is lasting forever, please know you CAN get through it! I know the deep frustration that comes from repeating the same mistakes and feeling stuck in a hard level. But I also know that God wants you to get through it and He provides what you need in this level to prepare you for the one to come. If you feel like you keep tripping up, try to change your approach. What are you missing? What tool is there to help you that you have overlooked? Who is there to give you a boost? Where do you need to pause and refuel? And what is a weak spot that keeps knocking you down?

There are some tools that you can ONLY get by going through the hard level. God didn't lead you into that level to defeat you; He led you to it to prepare you for the next one!

I heard God speaking deep into my spirit recently, with a gentle voice and an outstretched hand, “Welcome to the next level.”

I am only just now learning that this is both a celebratory promotion and a terrifying challenge into the unknown!

A few years ago, I stepped out of a hard level and mistakenly thought I was entering an easy phase now. I thought because I had beaten the last level, and the challenge was conquered, this new level would be a breeze! I was so disappointed, and frankly heartbroken, to, instead, encounter a new level of hard. I admit I felt defeated for a while because I was just plain tired, and it often felt too hard. New challenges and new terrain and new enemies sucker-punched me because I entered that level with incorrect expectations and very low energy. It took me a long time...too long... to realize that the hard level I had just left was preparing me for this new level.

I think our mistaken expectations of what growth looks like and requires often feels a lot like being sucker-punched. 

It’s like the teenager who can’t wait to get out of High School because they just know life will be so much easier (insert raucous laughter here!)...then reality hits them and they realize they just leveled up!

We often have grand expectations of ease and beauty in the next level, if we can just get there! Don’t get me wrong - there is plenty of beauty along the journey, and there are joyful surprises mixed in along the way. But our focus changes when we believe every step we take is preparing us for the steps we’ll have to take ahead.

Forty years into my journey, I am just now learning to adjust my expectations. When I do, though, I can be thankful for the tools and struggles in this level because I know they are going to help me in the next level. Much like that drooling teething baby, it may be messy and painful and I will probably whine and complain from time to time. But when I don’t have to eat pureed food any longer I will be so glad that I didn’t stay in the baby level! I am sure the children of Israel thought once they actually made it to the Promised Land, they would level out and life would be easy! But the first thing that happened was battle and struggle and new enemies. God used their history, and every step of those 40 years, to prepare them for the next level. He does the same today with you and I.

So get going, keep moving, stop looking back. Look for the tools and fuel and friends that are supplied in your current level. And soon enough, you’ll hear God’s gentle words welcoming you into the next level, which is always one step closer to Him!