Flying High

This morning as I sat out on the porch, in the early hour, I saw a power line.  Right in the middle of the line was perched a bird.  The bird looked back and it looked forward.  I was thinking to myself...now what do you do. If he has fallen off he would for sure die.   He seemed so confident, not afraid, just standing there suspended in mid air on the power line.  Then is a few moments it did the thing I expect most.  He flew away.

Sometimes walking a tight rope can seem like walking in faith to me.  I feel like a bird perched in mid air.  I wonder which way do I go forward or backward or am I frozen still?  Why was the bird so confident?  Because he could fly.  Do I believe I can fly?  Do I believe Gods Spirit is beneath my wings?  If jumped off the rope could I survive?  If I began to fall would the Lord surly catch me?  How I believe effects everything I do.  What is the theology of my heart, not my mind but what are the forces than nudge we away from my illusion of safety.  I can be like that bird and think I am so afraid, nothing can help me.  It is just me and God here.

God draws these fears out of our heart.  He reveals them to us through circumstances and people.  That is where He meets us at the point of our need.  Fear can paralyze us.  The fear of not succeeding with our jobs, children, marriage, ministry.  The fear of failure is a powerful thing.  But when we have the confidence that even if I fall or fail my God is with me.  He promises to use it all, the successes and the failures for better good than we can imagine.  He just wants us to try our wings of faith.  To jump off our false securities and attempt to fly.

To know Gods promises and that He will keep them to us even when we are afraid.  You cannot stay in the middle.  You can either press on in your own strength.  You can go backward and lose ground.  Or you fly away into freedom, empowered beyond anything you can do.

In His Hands He's got the whole world, the whole world in His hands?  Do I believe God is big enough to hold my whole life and future in His hands?  When I am in fear of pain and failure there is only one place to run, under the wing of our God.  When you think this thing is just between me and God really.  Many may give you advice but in the end it is you before God.  Will I step out, off, my security line and attempt to be free.  It is better to fail than not to do nothing.  When we are consumed with fear of what might happen, we do not move.  We become isolated, depressed or stuck in sin, we regress.  We pull away from God and others.  God can pull you out of this, rescue you, but in the meantime you try to stop time.  You cannot stop time but it can pass you by.  I know, I have been frozen for 17 years.  Now I am learning to trust God with my everything, my heart, my possessions, the loves of my heart, my future.  I am beginning to dream again.  To see life as full and adventurous, exciting.  My passive, hard heart has gotten courage and compassion.  There is no limit to how high I can fly.  I must just keep looking up if I want to live not just survive.  This life of faith is a whole new way of living to someone who has tried to do all the rules and found out she just can't.  But Christ did and He gives us that perfect obedience.  We just don't have one of our own and when we try apart from Christ, in our own strength, we cease to act out as a human living in this world.  We merely exist.  But Christ is our life.  We can accept it, live His life through us and fly.  "I'll fly away oh glory, I'll fly away."