Storm Chaser?

Been thinking all week about the parallel I drew on Sunday between storm-chasers and Christians who work in and through culture instead of running for cover whenever something "dangerous" shows up.

Think about it.  Storm-chasers know the danger, and yet they move closer, not hoping to be drawn in and over powered, but wanting to know more about what's happening and maybe learn something that will allow them to make a difference.  There are Christians, like Mike Foster and Craig Gross, who recognized the pull and power of porn in our culture, but rather than run from it, they engaged the industry and attempted to help people who struggled with porn and wanted out.  They attended porn trade shows (to give out Bibles) created the nations #1 Christian porn website (to provide help, accountability and filtering) and along they way, they caught a lot, a LOT of heat.

Want another example?  Today it's estimated that there are at least 27 million slaves world wide, everywhere from India in Asia to Indiana in North America.  It's starting to get a little more traction, but many Christians hear about that and do what Christians do - they pray.  But that wasn't enough for one kid who started when he was 12 years old to chase this storm.  Zach Hunter is doing what he can to put an end to human trafficking - and he's only 15.  Gary Haugen is a Harvard educated lawyer who gave up working for the US Dept. of Justice to start the International Justice Mission.  Why?  Because there's a storm of people being destroyed by slavery and we shouldn't be hiding from that, but chasing it.

One more for you.  We hear about crime and hate the statistic and often the criminals that they represent.  This is another one of those storms.  Christians are often happy that they are just "off the streets" which really just means we're happy that we won't have to deal with them.  Prison Fellowship as an organization does a great job with prison ministry, but when Catherine Rohr toured a prison, she chased the storm and left a lucrative Wall Street job,  emptied her 401k and moved to Texas to start the Prison Entrepreneurship Program that recruits business leaders, MBA mentors and others to help train prisoners to be productive in business when they get out.  A lot of Christians whine about crime, Catherine chased the storm in an attempt to do something about it.

So here's the question I've been struggling with and figure you should struggle with too: what storm should you be chasing that you're currently hiding from?