· When your ship comes in and you’re not ready.
· When you seem to be in someone else’s tea party.
· When life’s ups and downs leave you dizzy.
· When you can’t seem to get off the ground.
· When life’s heading for a drenching and you can’t stop it.
· When it seems your lifeboat can’t even save you from a splashing…
Just remember…
· To LAUGH because you’re NOT ALONE in the boat.
Our recent trip to Silver Dollar City with three grandsons gave us some thrills and WET chills as we experienced the various rides designed to either DIZZY-FY, FLUSTER-FY, MYSTIFY or DRENCH-A-FY (Pardon my words, for sometimes there is just no words to describe it.) And regardless of the nature of the rides or what it did to one’s insides, we lined-up for a repeat dose. Now, there’s a paradox! Of course, we “chalked” it all up to fun, and made some great memories with the grandsons.
It did put me in mind, however, of our lives and their seeming constant confrontations with that which doesn’t result in fun. Just the opposite! We get frustrated, anxious, fearful, and even sick in the midst of life’s variety of unwanted RIDES. And there are times when you see it coming and realize that you are powerless to avoid being hopelessly DRENCHED by it.
One paradoxical TRUTH that surfaced in my musings on the experiences of the day, was that sometimes that which we dread for its past affects on us, we will, with eyes open, STAND IN LINE to cause it to be repeated. Why do we do that? Do we forget, or are we waiting on God to keep us from doing that which we should not? I am afraid it is the latter. We like the excitement, the challenge of temptation’s draw upon us, but don’t want to pay the price of our yielding to its call.
The last picture of the lifeboat gives us a picture of what God would have us know about the experiences of life with its NEVER CEASING RIDES that challenge us. First, realize that we are not alone in the lifeboat. There are others who share our experience, so it is not unique to just us. Often, we cry out of such a crisis “WHY ME?” Well, it is not JUST YOU! Secondly, realize that there is ANOTHER WHO IS IN THE LIFEBOAT!. IN FACT, HE IS THE LIFEBOAT! You may be drenched, but IN HIM you won’t DROWN! It was His death on the cross that enables you to float above that eternal threat upon you. Finally, LAUGH WITH HIM as evidence of your ASSURANCE that regardless how rough the seas of our rescue, we ARE AND WILL BE VICTORIOUS IN HIM!
Oh, yes. What does the raccoon have to do with story? Well, after coming home to our house in the wild woods, the boys were sound asleep in the room just off the back deck. I was still awake, when suddenly the neighbor’s dogs began some serious howling. Amid this commotion, there was a lot of scratching, like something climbing on the vinyl siding. When I went to investigate…well, you see what I found. It was the first such critter we’d seen, aside from deer, squirrels and birds. YEP, WE LIVE IN THE WILD! The boys never woke up! In life, the wild need never destroy our peace and joy!
I Corinthians 10:13 "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above hat ye are able to bear; but will wiith the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it."
John 14:16-17, 27 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you...Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."
BE ENCOURAGED, FELLOW TRAVELERS!
2 comments:
Glad you had a good time with the boys.
Love and miss you.
HA! Sawyer looked half-nauseous in most of those pictures!!!!!
Glad you guys had a great time!
Love y'all!
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