"Lord, if it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the water."
"Come," he said.
Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came towarad Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out "Lord, save me!"
Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. "You of little faith," he said, "why did you doubt?"
This story from Matthew 14 is one we are all probably familiar with, and I am finding it especially applicable to my life these days after accepting to go on the World Race.
Like Peter standing on the boat and literally making eye contact with Jesus himself, I've had moments of absolute clarity, feeling the Holy Spirit within of me saying "Yes!! Yes! You've heard me, and you know what I want you to do. This is the next step in your life– the race! Let's do this, Daughter!" I've felt a warm peace and calm, covered with extreme joy. I knew that this was exactly what the Lord wanted me to do. So, I followed his call– "Come."
And as soon as I begin this huge step in my faith-journey, fear swells up in my heart. My attention is instantly drawn to the wind— something that has absolutely nothing to do with my walk with the Lord. Was Peter afraid of the fact that he was walking on water? Nope. Was he fearing the waves around him? Nope. He was fearing the wind.… What!?? How could he let the wind, of ALL things, cause enough fear in his heart to doubt the Lord who is standing within his sight? It makes no rational sense.
Like Peter, I begin to doubt my decision to follow the Lord's call on my heart when silly obstacles that have nothing to do with the situation begin to pop up around me.
"But Sarah– you're a tiny girl. How on earth will you be able to carry that heavy backpack?"
"Oh, and since you're so small… you'll probably be more prone to getting sick. It's really dangerous out there."
"I have no idea how you're going to fundraise THAT much money. Psh, good luck with that."
These are just a handful of the comments that I, and most likely many other World Racers, have been dealing with. And you know what? Sometimes it's really hard to filter them out. Sometimes, it's these comments that cause me to sink into doubt. "Yeah, maybe that wasn't the Lord calling me to go on the Race… maybe it was just some crazy idea I came up with on my own. And I am small, so how can I carry all that weight? And the money… psh! There's no way it's going to come in."
These issues are such lies and distractions to keep me here, "safe" in the US, ignoring Jesus' call to come. And in the past few weeks, I've learned to cry out to God to remind me of his sovereignty in all of this. And as frustrating as it might be for him to deal with, he IMMEDIATELY reaches out to me and pulls me back up to where I began, completely focused on him. Whoa, that is LOVE. I can just picture him laughing and shaking his head as he says, "Why did you doubt? I'm right here, you know it's me. Keep your eyes on me and you won't even notice the wind."
So wind, bring it on. Try and shake me now, because I have a Father who will always catch me.
