Faith For Change

Hebrews 11:6

"And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him."

Have you ever had your feet knocked right out from under you?

The other day at work I was putting a helmet on a preschooler in the middle of our bike pathway, when from the other side of the bike path, came hauling two incredibly ambitious young boys on tricycles. Of course, they were in a race so I was of no consequence standing in the middle of the road. Naturally, I also didn't see them at all. I took one step back and out from under me went both my legs and I flew into the air. Let me just let you know that this is also the time where parents are picking up other students and I was also in a dress. Yaay me!

I lay on the floor a little bit stunned trying to assess how many people had just seen me eat it and making sure that all the children surrounding me were okay.

"Miss Malia, you have to watch where you're going when you're on the bike path!" One of the boys whined. "Yeah. you shouldn't stand here while we're racing" the other one told me. they looked at each other both giggled a little bit..."good thing we're wearing helmets!" They both agreed. I sat there still stunned and shocked. I was horribly embarrassed and a little bit scraped but mostly my pride was injured.

I stood up realizing that no one other than these two students had just seen me fall and the embarrassment quickly went away. My calamity was even funny when I relayed the story to my boss five minutes later. 

 That makes me think about the one and only time I've ever been snowboarding.

It was my senior year in high school and my friends and I thought it would be fun to skip all of our morning classes and head up to the mountains for a little bit of snowboarding before we met our youth group at camp. Sounds like a good plan right? Except that I had never been and it was much harder than I supposed it to be.

I spent the whole morning on one slope. Falling hard over and over and over! I would get up and attempt to correct my stance or my angle or just try and pretend it was fun and then hit the cold ground all over again. I was in so much pain and embarrassment that evening and I am pretty sure I fell asleep during the first worship session. Oops. Even that day of falling has a sweet connotation in my memory.

But other times,when our feet are pulled out right from under us, we hit the ground and we don't recover so easily. In fact, most of the time when life decides to pull away the rug, it is a long and hard process of getting back up, finding your footing and deciding whether or not to even continue walking wherever you're headed. Sometimes the embarrassment is never overcome  and then turns into shame that festers into fear and despondency or bitterness or confusion. Other times we can stand up and correct whatever it was that led us to that fall in the first place.

I am finding that it is this scenario when change is easy for me to embrace. I think that is probably a quality learned from time spent in sports. Life is upside down? Something must be wrong- real quick let me change my hair, change my car, change my wardrobe or nail polish, change my social networking habits or my blog design, change my circle of friends, change my diet or change my hobbies and routines and life goals. Sweet! Change is great when I am controlling those changes.

And then there are times, like the season ahead of me now, where those changes aren't enough. Where God says "be holy as I am holy!" Where He asks things of me and I can feel myself hitting the floor and wondering what happened to my feet? Where did that tricycle even come from? Change that I can't  accomplish. Change that makes me wonder if I can really do this. Change that truly challenges and requires faith. Change that I must trust God to work out in me when I certainly don't trust myself and often struggle to trust Him.

The crazy thing is that the Old Testament heroes of the faith faced crazy obstacles and obeyed this holy God, not always perfectly, but they were commended in the faith. (Heb 11:39-40) 

 The game changer is this- We have Jesus. He's the something better provided to us. And geez! Is He better! He is better than any alternate reality my imagination can conjure up,better than any kind of normal, Higher than any fall I experience, kinder than I can even handle and greater than my heart.

These are the truths I cling to this week.