Fear and Faith!

I don't know if anyone in the world is going to truly understand this other than a person who has actually tried it. I have been working trying to learn to "drop in" on a half pipe. We have been skating a mini-pipe with the kids and so the drop is not completely vertical, but it is pretty close. To make a long story short you really have to throw your shoulder forward and lean way out to do it without wrecking. Everything in your body and mind rails against the thought of doing this and so you start to commit and then halfway through you try to lean back into a more upright position and that causes you to fall and hit your elbows, butt, and sometimes your head. Let's just say once you fall on your back from four feet up it gets a little scarier the next time you want to try. You would not believe the lesson God is teaching me in this. I sat on the top of a half pipe last night choking back tears as God dealt with me about fear, heart motivation, and what a big jerk I am. So my next three blog entries over the next few weeks are going to be about those subjects as they relate to this skateboard ministry in that order. So if you want to read about the fear continue on.

Before we go a lot further I want to post a picture of a half-pipe again so you can somewhat appreciate what I am talking about.

Now this picture is not me, and this is before the half pipe was actually done being built. But I hope you can see what kind of nutty crazy almost vertical drop for a couple of feet we are talking about, and the deck the guy is standing on is about four feet higher than the flat part of the ramp at the bottom. Actually standing on top of the ramp it looks even scarier and your heart will race with fear. I have seen teen aged kids cower in fear as they stand at the top and say no thanks I am not trying this.

So in an attempt to build my courage up we screwed down a little ledge half way up the ramp and I started dropping from there. Then we moved it up, and then up again to about 3/4 of the way to the top. Skaters watching me assure me that I can do it from the top, but you would not believe how much fear that last foot adds to the mix. So here I am last night in the almost dark standing on the top and the Lord dealing with me about walking by faith and not by sight. My eyes are what is telling me I can not do this, the people who know that I can encouraging me doesn't seem to help at all! Why is this? It is because I am choosing to believe what I see with my eyes and not the truth that I know in my heart.

God is using this half pipe to teach me to walk by faith more than anything He has ever used before. I even went so far as to close my eyes and drop from my little ledge so that I could start trusting. It is the same in our walk with the Lord. We see the world through our eyes and our eyes and senses reel telling us there is no way we can do this. God in the meantime is speaking to us and telling us we can do all things through Christ. Whether it be witnessing, tithing, preaching, teaching, singing on the worship team, or whatever ministry we are trying to do. Whether it be being a good husband, wife, parent, or quiting using drugs, or some other life change. Our eyes of flesh tell us we will never win, and we will never accomplish the task. As of the writing of this blog I have not dropped, but I am asking God to help me believe him that I can do even this. I wasn't a skater until I started learning so that I could advance his kingdom through a skate ministry, so I need to trust that he is with me, and even if I fall and get hurt know that God is working out all things for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. So check back next week and we will talk about heart motivation.