Dive in, Faith First
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- Published Sep 12, 2022
“But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus - the work of telling others the Good News about the wonderful grace of God” (Acts 20:24).
Laughter echoed off the walls of the deep end as I floated to the surface, defeated once again. The metal ladder felt soft on my feet as I trudged out to try again. Standing completely exposed, crowd now at full attention after multiple smacks to the surface, the water dripped off of my goose bumps.
It was the end of the summer. One last chance to add “I can dive,” to my list of skills. My dad smiled, and I laughed along with how lengthy the process had been. I took one more shot.
Smack.
Diving eluded me for a very long time. No matter how much skill others spoke into my mind, the fear in my heart of breaking the water with my head overwhelmed all possibility of a successful dive. I belly flopped until I traded diving completely for cannon balls. For a girl nicknamed “chicken wing,” those weren’t very impressive either. My dad, faithful to find the positive in everything, applauded my amazing pencil jumps into the pool, feet first.
Like my dad, God is faithful to applaud what He has given us naturally to do. But He doesn’t let us stay there. Like my dad continued to encourage me to keep trying to dive, God never lets us sit idle. Just as soon as we accomplish one impossible feat, He is on to amaze us with something else we never thought we could do.
Eventually, I could dive into the pool head-first. I even pushed the limit of my humanity and did somersaults off the diving board, too. The feeling of accomplishing an actual dive is something I’ll never forget, not just because of the work it took to get there, but the proud smile of my dad, who had faithfully encouraged me along the way.
Luke recorded in Acts, “But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for fishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus - the work of telling others the Good News about the wonderful grace of God” (Acts 20:24). God created us to move. Siting idle is against our nature. Each of us, in our own individual way, is living on earth to make our personal mark for the Kingdom of God. “My life is worth nothing,” unless I find God’s purpose for it and accomplish the task He has designed me for. No matter how long it takes me, I have to keep trying.
And in the learning curve, there is joy. I think of all the laughs my dad and I shared over those belly smackers, even to this day. The smack was painful, but each time I floated up to the surface laughing, and hopped back out to try again.
God is faithful to encourage us as we walk down the lane He has assigned us in life. Even when we are following the right road, finding our way in life can sting like a belly smacker, but it’s always worth it to float up to the surface and find the joy in the journey and to keep going. Because what is life if we don’t fully live it?!
Paul wrote to the Philippians:
“I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become righteous though faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with Himself depends on faith. I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised Him from the dead. I want to suffer with Him, sharing in His death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead!” (Philippians 3:7-13).
Wait … Paul wanted to experience belly smackers?! It’s essentially what he is expressing. He would gladly suffer if it meant living his life to the full in Christ Jesus. Jesus is amazing. Through His sacrifice, we are able to come into the presence of the Mighty God, even though sin is still dripping off of our goosebumps. He makes us worthy, and able to do the impossible. The Life Application Study Bible notes, on Acts 20:24, “Single-mindedness is a quality needed by anyone who wishes to do God’s work. The single most important goal of Paul’s life was to tell others about Christ. God is looking for more men and women who will focus on the one real task God has given us to do.”
Single-minded is defined by the English dictionary as “having or showing a single aim or purpose; dedicated, resolute, steadfast.” The amazing journey, living life within the love of Christ Jesus, is the single-minded focus He provides for us. The dedication, resolution, and steadfastness of life in the pursuit of holiness requires comes from the supernatural presence of the Holy Spirit in us. He resides in all who embrace Jesus as Savior. As we follow the lane home to our Father in Heaven, there will be many diving lessons along the way. The amazing thing about life is the turn-around. For every person God provides to help us proverbially learn how to dive, there is another for us to help travel the path we have tread.
“You can do it!” I encouraged. “I promise, you will be so glad you did.”
Teenagers think parents have their heads screwed on backwards. Everything we say gets run through a mill of mental questions. My daughter’s were spinning in her mind so fast, her feet were frozen to the rock where she stood. It’s since become a summer tradition to jump off the rock cliff and into the warm waters of the old quarry on an island near our home. But the first time, it didn’t matter how many voices tried to encourage and push her feet off of that rock. It wasn’t until her best friend offered a hand, and jumped in with her that she went.
Whether we have someone in life like my dad, to laugh at the belly smacks with us, or my daughter, a friend who will hold out their hand and jump off the cliff with us, all of us have the opportunity to embrace the permanent presence of Jesus to powerfully propel us through life’s scary moments, hard times, and painful trials. He’s always smiling in encouragement, sharing a laugh, and holding out His hand, in a prominently more surreal and perfect way than any human can. Paul wrote,
“I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead” (Philippians 3:12-13).
Recently, to cap off our first mission trip, the national team assigned to us took us across the street from the guarded camp we’d been staying to jump off the dock. The lake filled in a vast, old volcano crater, and the dock was higher than the quarry cliff on the island by our home. The first time we crossed the road, earlier in the week, my daughter could not move past her fear to join her friends. On this day, she was determined to make the leap into the lake. Once again, she needed a hand and a friend to jump in with her. After that, she swung from the trapeze-like bar and splashed down into the old filled-in volcano crater lake over and over again. It’s a beautiful memory, of a beautiful place.
Life is full of opportunities to jump into the proverbial lake. It’s full of promise to jump into actual lakes, too! Jesus is amazing. He died, so we could live life to the full. Yes, we are on a mission to spread the Gospel. We aim to be laser-focused like Paul, and endure the trials that threaten to trip us in order to live the life God intends us to live. But God created the world, and all of the beauty in it. There is a lot He wants to show us along the way. The work of the Lord is not all toil; there is joy in the journey.
We may be traveling down a dirt road, line with armed guards and protected by walls, yet the further up it we drive, the better view of the beautiful mountains, and the filled in crater of a lake. There is beauty all around us, in the midst of the mess. There are reasons to worship littered in the workloads we carry. Let’s not give up when we smack the water. Let’s keep laughing to the surface, choosing to see the good, and journey with our awesome, amazing, Jesus – Savior of the world, and our personal friend.
God Bless, and Glory Up.
Additional Resources
Life Application Study Bible, Third Edition. New Living Translation. Tyndall House Publishers. Carol Stream, IL. Copyright 2019.
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