Skydiving and Faith
My first marriage was to an airborne rigger. So I spent a lot of weekends at an airfield where he and our friends skydived.
Notice that I didn’t say that I did. No, to be candid, I was not okay with jumping out of a perfectly good airplanes then, and to tell you the truth I still am not.
Yet this process speaks a great deal about faith.
You see they always went up and came back down without a problem.
This did encourage me that it was safe from time to time, but my fear of heights, or falling which was part of the process, got the best of me and I would say no again.
I was more concerned with conquering my fears on the ground during my early twenties.
Looking Back
Looking back in remembrance it reminds me a lot about faith. The process of getting ready to dive, the flying, and the diving itself.
First you have to be prepared to dive. You have to be educated. You just can’t grab a parachute, strap it on, and go jump.
No you have to know how to pack your parachute. You have to know how to use it. And you have to be educated on how not to hurt yourself or others while you are out there.
If it is your first time diving you most likely will go tandem which means you will be strapped onto an experienced jumper and the two of you will go together.
Finally you get in the plane and take off. You reach a certain altitude and its time to jump. Each person jumps in a timely manner and dives into a freefall until it is time to pull the cord and release the parachute and head for the mark on the airfield.
Walking by Faith
Walking by faith is very similar. You have to be prepared. You have to be educated with Scripture. You have to pack your mind with it. You have to know how and when to use it so you don’t hurt yourself or others while you are out in the world.
We all need the help of other believers from time to time, but especially when we are young believers just beginning to take our first steps walking with the Lord. And no matter who you are we all need the Holy Spirit as our guide.
[Tweet “Sometimes walking by faith takes us to great altitudes where we have to put all our trust in God and jump in with both feet.”]
It can feel like we are in a free fall.
We have to know when to pull out what we know to be true to fit the moment to make the landing and hit the mark with both feet. This is where remembrance comes in. This is where the training we have done comes in.
This is where we remember what we packed in our spiritual parachute. However, there is good news. We are all jumping tandem. The Holy Spirit is right there with us to guide us to hit the mark perfectly. And if we don’t we all have brothers and sisters out there who can lift us back up in our time of need.
Packing Our Parachute
Last time we packed a scripture battling fear into our spiritual parachute so to speak. This week let’s pack in another.
When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. Psalm 56:3 NIV
and for remembrance sake let’s review last week’s
The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear;
The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?
Psalm 27:1 NKJV
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Another Samaritan Woman 