“Stay in the free fall, that’s where u find rescue.” Free fall: Rapid, uncontrolled plunge. Rescue: to bring out of danger, attack, harm; to set free, to save.
Rebekah Lyons came to speak at my church on Monday night this week. Her message to us was this: Receiving rescue requires responsibility. We are rescued out of our free fall. Once we have been rescued, it’s our turn to plunge into the darkness and proclaim light. Jesus has set us free, now, we go and be who we already are.
What a powerful message. We’ve been rescued, restored and made whole. We are set free! So what else can we do besides go take this story of redemption into the darkness? After all, the only place light works is in the darkness, right?
But, over the last couple of days I’ve found myself thinking more about the first part of the message. About being in the free fall, in the uncomfortable part, in the struggle, in the pain, the uncertainty.
Our initial free fall is this. “…all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. (Romans 3:23-24) Salvation. BOOM! We are rescued from a rapid free fall heading towards an eternity separated from God. This is by far the greatest story of rescue in the history of the world. But what about all of the other little, or not so little, free fall rides throughout our lives? What’s the story there? What’s happening here?
In Romans 5:3-5 Paul writes: “More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
I’m learning that God uses these places of uncertainty and “uncomfortableness” to grow us. He gets us into spots where our only choice is to seek Him, rely on Him, and most importantly, trust Him. During the fall God is teaching us something about Him that we can’t learn anywhere else. He’s showing us that He is sufficient. In 2 Corinthians 12:9 God told Paul: “My grace is all you need, my power works best in weakness.” God is moving us to the place He has for us, and along the way, through the struggle, he is teaching us something about Him that we need to know, something we are going to need to use in the next place we are going. And Jesus promises us this “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20). He’s with us in the free fall.
So we keep our eyes fixed on Him and keep worshiping because, when we are weak, we are strong in Him. “That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
There’s beauty in the free fall. In being in a place where you’re sustained only by God’s grace. Realistically, that’s where we all are too some degree. But, I think He wants us to get to a place where we are willingly stepping into a position of absolute dependence on Him so he can show us exactly who He is. Where we count on Him and trust Him to rescue us just like he promises.
Christmas 2004 my parents gave me a small Bible that I could travel with. My mom wrote these words on the inside of the cover:
“The greatest lessons in life come when we get out of our comfort zone and rely 100% on Jesus. Trust Him to meet all of your needs, be faithful and obedient to His Word and you will rest in His perfect peace.”
Almost 10 years later I’m holding onto this wisdom as I prepare to jump into one of my biggest free falls yet.
