Cut the rope

The barley in the field is golden, ripening in the summer sun – which I missed! Three weeks away and the garden is a wilderness of wild weeds, spinach and rhubarb fighting for space.

Awake still at 4 am, jet-lagged and tired, I realised it was still dark. When I left in early July, the sun was up by 4 am. We are sliding into a new season.

Transitions. They can be draining, challenging, scary. Hard. With a different perspective, though, they can be exciting, promising, full of hope.

I heard a story when I was away, part of a sermon. A climber was scaling a mountain. His timing was bad, and darkness began to fall before he’d even reached the summit. Clouds covered moon and stars. The darkness was profound. He could not go down. Unwisely, he decided to feel his way further upwards, and he fell.

Downwards he plummeted until at last, the safety rope round his waist grew tight and arrested his fall. He hung there, suspended in the darkness on the mountain side.

‘Save me, God!’ he cried out. And God answered him. ‘Do you really believe I can save you?’

‘Yes, God, you can save me!’ Again God asked, ‘Do you really believe I can save you?’

‘Yes! Save me!’ Once more, God questioned him. ‘Do you really believe I can?’

‘You can!’

‘OK,’ God said. ‘Cut the rope.’

The poor man clutched the safety rope tighter. He held on. He didn’t cut the rope.

His body was found in the morning, his hands frozen onto the rope.

He was a foot off the ground.

Transitioning to a new season of life can only be exciting, promising and full of hope when my trust is fully in God’s ability to carry me through, to save me in whatever situation I find myself. I can cling ever tighter to thinking I have to do it all, that everything depends on me, and be left dangling, frozen in fear. Or, sensing a changing landscape, I can look up with faith and trust, and cut the rope.

Even for that, I need God’s help.

Resistance makes you Stronger

Just back from the physio, who has given me another stretchy strip to use in restoring full use of this shoulder. I’ve to pull the ring tight and raise my hands over my head, as far as they will go. The resistance in the stretchy strip will strengthen the muscles as I stretch the tendons. Or something like that.

Basically, the thought is that the resistance will strengthen my body. 

There is so much in our world today which we need to resist. So many temptations to self-indulge, to do and view things we shouldn’t, to be self-centred and hard-hearted. It’s as we resist those temptations, in the name of Jesus and with the help of the Holy Spirit, that we become stronger in our faith, stronger in our ability to live out the good news of Jesus and bring light and life into places of darkness and death. And goodness knows those sorts of places are all around.

So today, I’m not going to moan about the things I need to resist. I’m going to ask help from God to change my attitude so that I welcome the tough things because as I resist, I will grow in faith and strength.

I often think of butterflies: if you try to help them break out of the cocoon they will not be able to fly. It’s only as they struggle to break the cocoon that they strengthen their wings to fly. It’s the same with raising kids: we can’t do everything for them or they will never be strong enough to do them on their own.

So, a wee lesson from the physio for me today. Resistance makes you stronger.

Stormy Weather

The wind is fierce outside today, bending trees low and flinging cold raindrops every which way. Down south there are floods; here it is just very windy, and wet and gray. Not sure how long it is forecast to last.

Inside my stomach another fierce storm is churning things up. I’ve picked up the bug that is plaguing the area right now, and just hope that it is limited to 24 hours. 

The year has just begun, yet all around me I see people contending with stormy weather in their lives. Financial challenges. Ill health. Untimely death. Homesickness. Grief. 

The list goes on.

The Bible recounts a time when Jesus’ friends had set sail on the Sea of Galilee at night. A fierce storm blew up and threatened to overwhelm them, and just at a point when they were near despair, they woke Jesus up and begged for his help. 

After gently scolding them for having so little faith, he turned to the wild wind and weather and commanded, ‘Peace, be still’. And immediately the wind and waves subsided and peace was restored.

May you and I call out to Jesus for help today with the storms raging in our lives, and may we all hear the his voice commanding the storms, ‘Peace, be still!’