Rationalizing the Walk

The high dive at Guilford pool was at least six feet high. At age eleven, my worst nightmare was jumping off of it. I imagined it. I'd fall screaming and flailing, only to hit the pool and be torn to ribbons. If by some miraculous chance I was still alive, I would surely drown in the twelve foot depths. I was perfectly content jumping off of the low dive. It was fun. For a while. Then I started wondering why none of my friends had been horribly annihilated by the terrible fall. They would tell me I should try it. I would tell them they were idiots. I think it was the day everyone was doing 360s that I snapped. I stood at the base of the ladder, nearly in tears, the line now folding over itself behind me. Maybe it was the constant death threats and "hurry up kid!" being repeatedly shouted at me, but I did it. My eleven year old psyche in shambles, I ran up the ladder as fast as I could and launched off the diving board. When I hit the water, though slightly shocked at the lack of lacerations and contusions I had endured, I simply remained underwater and mimicked death. I think it was the wake of the next kid that snapped me back to reality. After surfacing, making a doggy paddle dash to the ladder, and pulling the obligatory "high dive wedgie" out of my pants, I immediately got back in line. The high dive was the best kept secret in the world.

To this day I'm still afraid of heights. But I'm eternally grateful I stopped thinking and jumped off that stupid plank. And here's the point of that overly-dramatized story. Sometimes we out think our actions. We talk the talk, then we rationalize the walk.

In the book of Mark, Jesus heals a man with paralysis. The paralyzed man's buddies climb up the side of a building with the man on a mat. Trying to find some way to get through the crowds surrounding Jesus, they then proceed to lower him through the roof. Awesome. Jesus first tells the man his sins are forgiven, then tells him to pick his mat up and walk. Then the man gets up and walks on out.

But what if the man didn't get up?

What if he sat there and though to himself "I've been paralyzed for quite a while now. What if I look like a fool? What if this guy Jesus isn't who He says He is? Just because this guy touched me, I shouldn't be able to walk." The list could have gone on and on. But it didn't. Scripture doesn't suggest the man had any other response than doing exactly what Jesus told him to do. He got up and walked.

How often do we not just get up and walk? How often do we think about how high the high dive is, how deep that water is, or how very sick we are. We rationalize everything. "Polar bear swims are just too cold." "I'll look really stupid if she says no." "I'm too tired to write right now." "I really need this money...I just can't let go of it right now." All rationalizations I've used before. As an academic, it hurts me to say this, but I think we could stand to think a little bit less about almost everything we do. Or don't do.

Aren't the best parts of the story when the character overcomes some great adversity to get something he wants? There's something all of those characters have in common. They hadn't completely made a rock solid plan before they acted. Few of them scarcely had time to think at all. There are at least five to ten good reasons why you shouldn't do anything that's good. But you'll find a life infinitely more rewarding if you charge recklessly into the world with Christ. So the next time your mind thinks "I want to go for a run!" Go run, right then. Yes, you might not have time later for that thing you were going to do. But you're not thinking of that. You're in the street with snow in your lungs and salt on your shoes.