Control

I just finished the most delightful meal with our youth guy. ( He just does not fit into that youth pastor box) It was delish! His wife made the most awesome pie. It was a cream cheese layered with apple and crumbles pie. SO GOOD!!

I went tobogganing with the youth on Friday night. The thought of sitting on a plank and hurtling myself down a slope made of ice, no longer sends joy to my heart. It makes me think of pain. Muscular pain, bruises, injured joints and many other things that happen when you are hurtling down a slope of ice at high speed, with only a board between you and the extremely hard snow/ice. But I was there so I gave it a go.

I found an appropriate instument for hurtling myself down the hill. It was like a crazy carpet but with a foam padding on the upper surface to perhaps soften the blows of the bumps on the hill. So I sat on it looking down at the rest of the hill going "of my word", then I closed my eyes and pushed off and down I went. But I did not go straight down like all the other sleds, this one decided that half way down it would turn so that I was hurtling down this hill of ice backwards. Fortunately it then turned some more so that I could see where I would finally stop.

The next move is to get off and then begin the ascent to the top of this very steep hill, that I just hurtled down. It gave me time to think. Why was I apprehensive about that first initial push off the top of the hill. I knew it was fairly safe, I mean this is one of our national past times, and I had just witnessed many people going down the hill with no injury, so what was up? Then it hit me. Once I started heading down the hill I was no longer in control. All I could do was hold on tight.

I decided to go down the hill one more time. I hopped on my padded crazy carpet, gave a really good push to get a lot of speed and down I went. I once again turned and faced the starting point and then turned some more. Then, when I was facing the correct way again I realized something. The person on the really hard wooden toboggan, that was directly in front of me was stopped and I was still moving. So it was decision time, keep going ond hit the person in front or attempt to stop. What would it be. I decided to stop. So I put my feet out, in a feebble attempt to stop. But instead of coming to the graceful stop I had envisioned, I flopped onto my side and hit my head on the ice. I was stopped all right. So after getting up and making sure nothing was broken, I started to climb up the hill.

I went down the hill one more time with no incidences and decided that enough was enough. Later, I was thinking, when I tried to control the situation, that is when I got hurt. Isn't that what God is all about, when he is in control we are safe, we might be hurtling down a hill of ice on a piece of plastic but we are safe. BUT when we try to control things because we think we should, that is when we loose control and end up getting hurt.