No Growth in the Comfort Zone

Hi everyone! My name is Courtney Wong and I just finished my final year studying business at Western University. During my time at university, I was involved in Western’s Asian Christian Fellowship (ACF), and I’m now back home attending Toronto Christian Community Church (TCCC).

I wanted to take the time to share with you some of the lessons God has been teaching me through my time at university. Just for some background, I grew up in a Christian family and have attended church ever since I was young. I was exposed to the gospel at a very young age and had multiple opportunities to witness God’s faithfulness in action. But even though I saw God’s goodness all around me, I constantly fell into a pattern of living out a complacent faith.

It was around my second year when God revealed to me the dangers of living a “comfortable” Christian life. On the outside, I was a “good” Christian: I was reading God’s Word regularly, spending time with Christian friends, and going to church every Sunday. But on the inside, I was feeling dry in my faith and distant from God. The immense joy I felt when I had first accepted Christ had been drowned out by many other priorities in my life.

This is the part of my sharing where I want to talk about Carmen, a girl that God placed in my life. Carmen was the same age as me, but she had such an aura of maturity to her and it was so clear that Jesus was the center of her life. She had been elected to be our VP External for the ACF school year and was in charge of leading the outreach ministry. She had a huge heart for the poor and marginalized in London, and often spent her time volunteering in the local community, sharing with others the love of Christ.

That summer after second year, I received a message from a friend who told me that Carmen was in the hospital in critical condition. One week after receiving that message, Carmen passed away. It was such a sudden shock to everyone. One moment she was making plans with friends, and the next, she was confined to a hospital bed in a coma she would never wake up from. Her passing stung so much for me. Words cannot express how shocked, frustrated and confused I was that God had called her home so soon.

But I want to take some time to speak about a conversation I had with her just two weeks before she passed. We were at a nearby café and I was asking her why she had decided to step up as our fellowship’s VP External that year. She shared with me how much her heart broke for those who didn’t know the gospel, and how desperately she wanted those in the London community to know Jesus in a personal way. Her joy was so fixed on the cross and absolutely nothing could deter her from sharing the gospel with everyone she met.

It has been two years now since that conversation, but I still look back and reflect on the passion she had for serving and loving others. I realize now that our lives here on earth are so short and fleeting. Ecclesiastes speaks about how “life is utterly meaningless” if we are living for the temporary things of this world. Carmen knew that with so much conviction; her eyes were constantly fixated on eternity. As I reflected on my own life, I realized just how much I lacked that conviction in my own faith. I was reminded that life is so short, and here I was living like God had not given me a greater purpose and calling.

I wrestled with these truths for a very long time. It was just a few weeks later that I was approached by the ACF exec team to see if I would consider stepping into the role of VP External for that upcoming school year. At first, every part of me wanted to say no. How could I carry Carmen’s torch and take over a ministry that she so clearly had a vision for? How could I encourage the whole fellowship to be better witnesses for Christ if I myself was afraid to share the gospel with my closest friends? How could I be sure that this was really where God wanted me to be?

I don’t really know what pushed me to say yes at the end of the day. I remember praying about it for a long time and asking God to show me where He wanted me to go and how He wanted me to serve. If this was where God wanted to place me, I just had to trust that He would also prepare and equip me.

They say there’s no growth in the comfort zone and no comfort in the growth zone. And that honestly couldn’t be truer. There were a lot of challenges that I encountered stepping into this role, but I wanted to speak specifically about my experience running an initiative ACF organizes called “Campus Evangelism”. Every Friday, we go to the University Community Center to try to share the gospel with students on our campus. We approach students to ask questions like “What do you think happens after death?” to spark conversations about faith and religion. At first, I was terrified. If you know me well, you know that I hate speaking in public. The very thought of approaching strangers to get their thoughts on death made me extremely uncomfortable. I felt inadequate knowing that I would be encouraging others to do the same.

All I can say is that God is truly a good God. Despite my fears, God filled me up with peace and gave me the words to speak even when I felt like I had none.

I felt inadequate and scared... but God reminded me that there is power in the gospel and that He is ultimately the one who equips me.

Although some students turned us away, many others listened and asked us questions about faith, life, and salvation. After every student I talked to, I felt a greater sense of joy and excitement; it was truly God working in and through me.

It was actually in this place of great discomfort that I grew so much in my faith. My eyes were once again open to the transformative work of the gospel and God’s saving grace. Through these experiences, I realized that it wasn’t enough to go to church every Sunday or attend fellowship every Friday. God had called me to live out an active Christian faith that pursued him faithfully and lived boldly for the sake of the gospel. I am constantly reminded of Romans 1:16-17 which says: For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

I used to be content living a comfortable Christian life…but God reminded me that the gospel compels us to live boldly for His kingdom.

To be honest, I’m still very much a work in progress. I still struggle to let go of the things in this world that so easily tempt me. I still go through dry periods in my faith where I struggle to open God’s Word. I am still unsure where God is leading me next or where He is calling me to go. But I now know with so much confidence – just as Carmen did – that the God we worship is so faithful and good, and I’m excited to see what He has in store for me.

If you ever find yourself in a season where you are feeling too comfortable in your faith, please know that I’ve also been there many times before. If this is you, I want to encourage you to take some time to reflect on the powerful truths of the gospel – that a PERFECT God would love sinful, detestable human beings like us. The gospel is TOO GOOD for us to simply keep to ourselves, and TOO LIFE CHANGING for us to simply stay the same.

And lastly, if you are not yet a believer or are still figuring out Christianity for yourself, I want to ask you the same question we ask at Campus Evangelism: What do you think happens after death? Life on earth is short, but there is a God who loves you and wants you to be with Him for eternity. Feel free to message me if you want to know more!