God on the Go: Feeling Awkward

Do you ever feel awkward? You are not alone! Feeling awkward is a common experience and studies show that about 25% of people notice when something awkward is happening. Moses sometimes felt awkward and inadequate, especially when God chose him to lead the Hebrews out of slavery in Egypt. Find out how Moses grew into his leadership role and became a great leader, the perfect example that feelings of awkwardness are not as significant as God’s purpose for our lives.

What’s New!

Monday Story:

• Moses felt awkward going to talk to Pharaoh.

Tuesday Key Verse:

• Luke 12:29 – I repeat: Don’t let worry enter your life. Live above the anxious cares about your personal needs

Wednesday Prayer:

• God, when I feel like I don’t fit, when I feel like I’ve done something silly or clumsy, help me see that You are bigger than my awkwardness. Thank you for all the feeling You give me. Help me know that You love me, even when I’m awkward. In Jesus’s name, amen.

Thursday Question:

• What is a time you have felt awkward? Why?

Friday Fun Fact:

• Q: What percentage of people actually notice when we’re feeling awkward?
• A. Only 25%

Show Notes:

To get this week’s episode and daily text prompts, text the word Go to 89419.
If you are in Canada, text GodOnTheGo to 866-729-1065

Transcription:

I had only been going to school for just a few days. I was in Kindergarten and I was so excited about school. I mean, it was a little scary, but I was really excited too. Well, this one day I had been learning how to ride the bus. Now I’d already had an issue on the bus because the first day I rode the bus, my very first day of Kindergarten, I didn’t know which bus stop I was supposed to get off of, and I ended up having to stay on the bus for a longer amount of time. So, that was a little scary. But then I got over it and I figured it out. Well, a few days later, for some reason, our buses were late that day and the weather was really bad. So, all of the teachers brought us back into the big gymnasium and we waited and waited and waited.

And you know what sometimes happens when you’re waiting and waiting and waiting, eventually you need to go to the bathroom. So, here I was as this little kindergartner. I didn’t really know where to go because I’d never been in this big gymnasium before. And so, I began to look for the bathroom. Well, I found one, but it was really crowded. There was a long, long line. There were a lot of girls in line to use that bathroom. But then I noticed another door, just one door over, and there was no line at that door. And when I opened the door, there was no one in there. So I went in and went to the bathroom. And when I came out, a teacher stopped me and she said, what are you doing going in that bathroom? And I said, well, I needed to go to the bathroom. And the other one was crowded. And she said, don’t. That’s the boy’s bathroom! I was so embarrassed. I felt so awkward.

I’m Julie Lyles Carr, and this is God on the Go, where we help you make the Minutes Matter part of the Purposely Podcast Network. And we’re going to be talking about feelings over the next few episodes, and we’re going to be talking about some of the feelings that sometimes we might even feel like we don’t have a word for. We don’t really know how to describe what that feeling is. We’re going to work on giving our feelings some names, because when we give our feelings some names, then sometimes it helps us know what to do with them. It can help us look into God’s Word. It can help us when we pray, to describe what’s going on inside of our hearts. And so feeling awkward is a feeling that I know all too well.

When you feel awkward, it’s like you’re embarrassed. You feel a little clumsy. You feel like you didn’t do the right thing, but you don’t know exactly what the right thing to do would’ve been. You feel a little bit like you’re out of place. It’s like how I felt when I realized that I’d gone to the wrong bathroom. I mean, wow. I just felt like I maybe didn’t fit, like I wasn’t supposed to be there. I didn’t know what to do next. Feeling awkward. It’s a big, big feeling. Well, here’s some interesting news. Sometimes when you feel awkward, when you feel embarrassed, you feel like everybody’s looking at you, that everybody knows that you made that mistake. But here’s something exciting. For all the people that you think might notice how awkward you’re being. Usually only around 25% even notice anything happened.

There was a study that was done in 2000 and the researcher had various people go to class wearing kind of a goofy T-shirt. They thought that probably about half the people in that room would remember that goofy t-shirt. But when they looked at all of it, it’s something called the Spotlight Effect. It means that sometimes we think more people are noticing when we’re being awkward than really do. So, only about 25% of people notice when something awkward is going on, which I think is good news because I do a lot of awkward things. When you and I feel awkward, we’re not alone. There’s a guy in the Bible by the name of Moses, and he ends up being one of the most important leaders that we read about in the Bible. But he was someone who definitely felt awkward. God told him that he was supposed to go and talk to Pharaoh, who was the ruler over Egypt. Now, God’s people, the Hebrews, had been enslaved in Egypt for a long time, and God chose Moses as the person who was going to go talk to Pharaoh and to say, let these people go. Release them from the slavery that they’ve experienced.

And what does Moses do? Does he say, all right, God, I know you’re with me and I’m going? No, Moses says, oh, please don’t make me be the one to go. He reminds God that he doesn’t feel like he’s much of a speaker, that he has issues. When he tries to talk, he says, please God, let someone else talk for me. I don’t want to be the one. He feels so awkward that he’s willing to kind of almost argue with God about “I should not be the person doing this.” Because God is gracious God for a little while comes up with a workaround. He has Moses’ brother, Aaron go with Moses for these meetings with Pharaoh, and Aaron ends up doing a lot of the talking for a while, but over time, Moses realizes that his feelings of being awkward, well, they certainly aren’t as big as His God is.

And you can see as the Bible tells the story of Moses and all of the time that it took to have the Hebrews freed from slavery, all the times that Moses has to meet with Pharaoh, and then when Moses is leading the people out in the desert before they come into the promised land, Moses is talking more and more and more. He’s becoming more and more confident, and he becomes this incredible leader because he learns that his feelings of being awkward are not as big as God’s purpose for his life. That really helps me when I think about the awkward, weird, clumsy things that I often do,. Those feelings and those times that I really am being awkward, they’re not bigger than what God has for me. Your feelings are important, but they don’t have the last word. God can give you the gifting, the time, the power, the patience… anything you need to do that he asks you to do, you can do. Even when you have to do i feeling a little awkward. I love this verse that Jesus speaks to us from his time of ministry here on earth. He says, I repeat, don’t let worry enter your life. Live above the anxious cares about your personal needs. That’s from Luke 12:29. And what it reminds me is that when I get real worried that I’m going to look kind of silly or clumsy or awkward in a situation, and when I feel awkward when I do something clumsy or silly, at the end of the day, here’s what I do know… God loves me awkward and all.

I’d love for you to text me at 8 9 4 1 9 because when you do that, that allows me to text you the memory verse, the trivia fact we talked about today, other great discussion questions that you can have about this story, and this feeling of being awkward. And in the next few episodes, we’re going to be talking about some other emotions that maybe you don’t always hear being talked about. I’m so excited to take this journey with you as we talk about feelings. I’ll see you next time. I’m God on the Go.