One of the most peaceful experiences of my life followed a
period of great anxiety. This happened
while Sheryl and I were vacationing in Mexico before we had Kyla and David.
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| Sheryl and I are the ones on the bottom right corner. This was a sunken ship off the coast of Jamaica on our anniversary in 2014. |
My wife Sheryl is a certified scuba diver. One of her favorite activities if we go near
an ocean (it also has to be warm) is to strap a large tank of oxygen to her
back and swim under the water for long periods of time. She insisted that I would love it too.
Being an adventurous sort, I decided to try the beginner’s
dive. This involved an hour of
instruction in a classroom-type setting.
They give you all of the hand signals you need to know while you are
under the water – evidently, they can’t hear you while you’re screaming into
your oxygen mask! Some of them are a
little confusing. For instance, if
everything is okay, you do not want to stick your thumb up. This is the sign that we need to swim to the
surface. After the not-so-lengthy
instruction, they strapped us up and shoved us into the water.
“I’m not getting enough air!” was my first thought. I had snorkeled before and assumed (falsely)
that it wouldn’t be much different as far as the breathing went. As I began to thrash around in the water, my
next thought was, “You are panicking.”
My third thought was, “They are not going to refund your
money at this point.” My cheapness won
the day and I began to take slow deep breaths.
After a while, I began to feel okay about this new venture. Then we began to descend along the bottom of
the ocean. We swam toward the wreckage
of an old airplane which really is neat to swim around. Then we moved toward some coral reefs. The coral and the fish were simply
amazing. It went from really
frightening to really peaceful within a handful of minutes. As you swim along, you hear your own breathing slow and steady in your ears. It is very
relaxing.
Sometimes in life, we have to move past our anxieties to
really enjoy the peace that is at hand.
Jesus Christ calls us to do this quite often. We may be experiencing some great worry but
as we face it, we often find that we were more able than we realized. As Christians, we see that God gives us strength to move past our fear into life. God wants us to know this peace and I believe it comes at all
levels. It can be personal. This peace may take place in our families. It sometimes takes place on a national
scale. Peace is even God’s plan for the world. This Sunday, we
will continue to look at the Sermon on the Mount and the particular passage that deals with worry: Matthew 6:19-34. Join
us for worship and breathe deeply!
In Christ,
Sam
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