I saw people jump and drop down til they were just a small dot in my line of vision, then bounce back. My stomach up through my chest was filled with butterflies, and I kept telling myself that all I needed was 20 seconds of insane courage. Only 20 seconds.
I counted the seconds that the jumpers were in free fall until the bungee was long enough to catch them. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.
Seven seconds of falling. Seven seconds of out-of-my-control direction. Seven seconds of nothing to hold on to except the knowledge that there was a bungee that was going to pull me back up and save my life. And the hardest part was taking the leap.
I knew that there was probably a million ways this could go wrong. But as I stood on the ledge looking out over the canyon ready to fall, my mind was blank. All I held onto was the direction from the instructor: take a deep breath, go on 1, and pull the rope after 2 bungees.
5. 4. 3. 2. 1. I had my arms spread out like wings and I leaned my whole body forward. As my feet left the platform, I realized that I was completely at the mercy of the bungee cord, and I let out all the fear inside me with a howling scream that was swallowed up by the canyon.
It was not long before I felt the stretch of the bungee cord catch up to me and bounce me back up to where I felt safe and secured.
I bounced a few more times, and then, as the instructor told me to, I undid the buckle holding my feet together so I could flip back upright. As I sat there, suspended in the air, waiting to be pulled back up, I marveled at the beauty of the canyon. It was no longer a view partially obstructed by bars and cords. It was a full panorama. It was a masterpiece.
I got back up to the platform, adrenaline pumping, wanting to jump again. Doing what scared me showed me that I was capable of surviving. Capable of conquering. And brave enough to take the leap.
My friend made the jump from three times the height that I did. Watching her fall was terrifying. She kept falling for 20 seconds without even a tug of the bungee cord to let her know that there was something there to catch her.
She kept getting lower and lower, until I thought she might touch the lake below her, or crash into the rocks at the bottom. She didn't. Just in time, she bounced back up. She said it was the most terrifying thing she's ever done, but that the adrenaline was amazing.
Almost everyone in our 8 person group made the jump that day. All of us terrified beforehand, but driven by the excitement and the hope of being able to say "I did it."
I can't do something as exhilarating as bungee jumping without instinctively relating it to the bungee effect of the Savior's love.
Sometimes when we get complacent or comfortable in life, He will situate us on a ledge and tell us to jump. He will tell us what to do. All we need to do is take a deep breath, count to 5, and fall into his hands, his control, and his direction--holding only to the knowledge that he is in control and will bungee you back.
Sometimes he doesn't ask us to jump. Sometimes he removes the platform from underneath us and let's us fall. And when that happens, and we realize we have no control, and we let out a scream consumed by the surrounding darkness, we need to remember that we are at the mercy of the most reliable being in the universe. The ultimate bungee cord.
He will let you fall so far, and so long, but he will always bungee you back. Even when you're headed for rock bottom. Even when you can reach out and feel the bite of the frozen waters. He will rescue you.
I don't pretend to know why some people have a longer bungee cord than others do. I don't know why some are asked to jump and others just have the ground fall out from under them. But I know that we're all strapped in. That's just a given when you're a child of God.
I also know that challenges turn us upside down and right-side up again and let us see a bigger picture, unobstructed by the things we didn't know before we fell. We get a new perspective. And we emerge victorious. We emerge being able to say "I did it."
We emerge knowing that we are capable of fighting. Capable of surviving. Capable of conquering.
No comments:
Post a Comment