Against the Wind
James 1:2-4 (NLT)
Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.
Ever hit a wall?
Not a physical wall with a fist in anger.
But a wall in life…Spiritual. Emotional. Professional.
Peddling to Savannah’s soccer match last Tuesday, I discovered another devastating Delta dilemma: the unchecked furry of the wind. While I’ve bicycled through wind before, the onslaught of air furiously blowing in my face was unmerciful and unrelenting. It was, quite literally, like hitting a wall when I made the turn in that direction, the bicycle moving mere inches every time I chugged my legs. As the sweat poured and my quads transformed into limp noodles, I thought that biking into the wind is a lot like life.
The vicious winds of adversity slam into us daily, whether it comes in the form of searching for your purpose, dealing with corrupt co-workers, raging against the broken education system, negotiating family squabbles, reaching out to those who don’t want help, or displaying love to the person who stabs us in the back. Whatever form they come in, they push against us and our making it our destination and the joy that comes with it.
Last Tuesday, as I made that left and hit the wall of wind, I had a choice to make. I could have wilted under the pain and frustration and struggle that is pedaling through 20 mile an hour winds with gusts of up to 30 miles per hour. I could have turned around and ridden on the breeze back to O’Bannon or home and saved some grief. (And yes, I could have even swallowed by pride and driven over there but that’s not part of the devotional illustration). But because of the joy of seeing my daughter’s face lit up by my presence there, I sucked it up, channeled my inner Lance Armstrong (pre-steroids), and made the match.
Same with us in life. As we meet these walls, these persecutions, these struggles in our daily lives, we have a choice to make. We can retreat back into the comfort of indifference or lash out verbally. Or we can see these ferocious winds as opportunities to grow, to trust God, and remind ourselves there is great joy awaiting us.
And, despite the raging winds of life, there is joy found in the journey as well. Because Jesus never leaves us. Remember that the next time you hit your wall.
