I have a ridiculously silly and embarrassing confesssion: I have never learned to roller skate. I may have grown up with school skate nights, attending Christian nights at the rink with our youth group more times than I could count, and I have even been the one to set up and attend skate nights for our church's children's ministry and youth events as an adult. I had even, on occasion, laced up skates and allowed one of my friends to pull me around the rink, but never, ever, have I even attempted to actually learn to skate.
I like to blame my lack of skating skills on this cute, sad little story about a boy. When I was in 6th grade, there was this boy, who asked me to "go out with him" in my first real Valentine's Day card. We went to the school Square Dance together, and talked on the phone, and I develeoped a giant crush. He then asked me to go to the school skate night with him, and he would teach me to skate. Well, the weekend before the big event, I broke my little toe. I couldn't go and that night, instead of teaching me, he skated with one of my best friends. He called me afterwards to tell me that when he held her hand, he realized he wanted her to be his girlfriend, along with me. Well, I never liked sharing, so I said no thanks and ended it, but my heart was crushed. I skipped the next couple of skate nights due to "young girl ridiculousness".
While the story about the boy really did happen, it is only an easy and fun story to tell when asked why I don't skate. Really, I outgrew that emotion the very next time a cute boy looked my direction, and still, I never learned. I don't think I have ever entered a rink where someone didn't offer to teach me to skate, and I turned everyone of them down flat. Eventually, I started telling my friends that I would only go along with them if they promised not to try to force me to learn to skate.
The sad part is this, I wanted nothing more than to know how to skate. It looked so fun and carefree and I wanted to try it so badly, but at some point without my realizing it, skating went from something I was sure would be fun, and joyful, to something I knew would be painful and not be worth the risk. I was scared to death of falling, of breaking something and the pain that I might feel. I had fallen on my bum at least once while some well meaning person failed at catching me, and that had hurt enough. What would it feel like if I was going fast and on my own, and it wasn't my padded rear end that I landed on? So I sat on the sidelines and watched. I took pictures of others having fun, I smiled and pretended I was having a great time. For a time, I clung for dear life to the sides and the hands of someone I trusted, only just enough to go around with them one time and no more. But eventually, I no longer put my trust into a single one of the people who offered to help me to keep me from looking stupid, crashing and creating a disaster. So now, as I write this, I am 42 years old, and have never learned to skate, no matter how much I wanted to. The real reason I never learned to roller skate was fear. Fear that crept up slowly, and without my realizing it had happened until it was fully set in and taking up residence in my mind.
Rollerskating may not seem like that big of a loss, I have surely lived without it (although, it's really a bummer when those 80's songs come on and everyone is sailing around the rink to one of your favorites while you just sit on the side and bop your head like you're having a blast), but my experience with skating, or lack there of, is so similar to the way many of us are living life. At first, we are curious about everything and want to experience all that we possibly can. We are ready for adventure. But then, fear sets in. We begin to worry about what might happen, or we experience pain, and the idea of ever repeating that pain keeps us from being willing to try at life again. We get dropped, and become so afraid that the person who dropped us, no matter how well intentioned, might drop us again, so we no longer trust them or anyone else to help us through. We are all skaitng through life by clinging to the wall, barely making it around, instead of getting out into the middle, where we can get into a groove, feel the wind in our hair, move to the beat of our favorite music, and truly enjoy the abundance and freedom that God intended for our lives.
I think part of the problem, at least for me, is in who and what we have learned to trust. As a Christian, I would give you an auto-pilot answer to the question - in whom do you place your trust? Jesus of course! But lately, I have been contemplating that question at a deeper level, in my own life and in those that I love.
And what I have found is that it seems we all are quite confident that bad things are going to happen, so sure that something is going to go wrong, and we spend enormous amounts of time talking about what could go wrong, expecting the worst. Yet, we don't speak quite so confidently of good things happening or of those good things remaining good. How sad is it that when things are going well in our lives, we automatically go on watch for what will go wrong ("waiting for the other shoe to drop" or "I knew it was too good to be true" )? And when rough things are happening, we just assume it will keep going on that way, becasue after all, "when it rains, it pours".
Growing up in the church, it's sad to say, but I was taught this mentality constantly. If we had an amazing service where we encountered God, we would be warned to "watch out, because the enemy is going to try to steal this from you, come after you, etc...". Instead of rejoicing over someone being redeemed, healed or set free, so often people are just waiting for them to mess up, go back, or fail again. How is that trusting in a Savior whose grace is sufficient?
Even scriptures were automatically turned into negatives. The verse that says He looks at the heart? It was always taught to me that it meant I better be careful, if I hid anything negative in my heart, God saw it even if man didn't. I was a grown adult before someone helped me see a different perspective; what if that verse meant God knew the good things of your heart, even if man didn't? I grew up believing that every sin, every mistake, and every wrong thought would doom me to Hell forever, even though I loved Jesus with every fiber of my being and had accepted him as my savior as a young girl. I was sure that Jesus might return when I had not yet repented of a sin I wasn't even sure I had committed and I would not make it to Heaven. For the record, my mom didn't teach me these things, just decent but misled people in our church, who were bound by fear instead of set free by grace. They were afraid of sin, instead of truly understanding that Jesus had conquered sin and death. Absolutely we must repent, it is absolute that we are called to live holy lives before the Lord. But His grace, mercy and love, draw us out of our sin, not man or enemy-made fears.
How did this God that they were presenting match with the God of the Bible that says he is able to keep that which is committed to him? That he who the Son sets free is free indeed? That when we come to him with our junk and confess our sins and accpet him as our Savior, we are new creations? We are HEIRS to the kingodm, adopted sons and daughters of the King of Kings.
But we aren't living like it. We are living scared, holding the wall for dear life, if even being willing to get out there and try living at all. I have found that we have learned to worry and plan for the bad things to happen, to jump through hoops to prevent the falls (or to sit on the side so a fall isn't even possible), more than we have been able to truly grasp the love our Heavenly Father has for us, to trust that He is able to sustain us, carry us, andeven bless us to walk in his favor. He says he has plans for us, and they are good. He wants us to live, and live abundantly. He wants us to trust him to show up, much more than we trust the enemy to show up.
And will the enemy show up? Will we fall, maybe even hurt a little? Absolutley. But God is right there, ready to catch us. I would like to tell you that I went out and learned to roller skate, but that hasn't happened yet. But you never know what can happen! I can assure you that if I did go out to learn, it will hurt. Maybe a lot. But just maybe, it would be worth it. Maybe I would learn, and maybe I would love it.
What I can tell you is I have been learning to let go of fear, to trust my God. And I am encouraging you to ask yourself, who do you really trust? Are you already planning the falls and wasting way too much energy on fear, on protecting yourself form pain instead of trusting the Lord to do just that for you? It's time that we walk the walk, and trust God at his word. He is able to keep us in his perfect love, and perfect love casts out all fear. When the enemy shows up and tries to knock us back down, we have a Savior to catch us and help us start again. Before we know it, we will be following his lead, picking up the pace, feeling the beat of his heart, getting into a groove and experiencing the joy that comes from truly living, embracing all that He has planned for us.
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