| Begin or End each week with a Meaningful Inspiration. |
Over The Edge? by Tim Knappenberger |
Early in the "BK
era" of our marriage, (Before Kids), Beth and I took
a short vacation to Niagara Falls. Having little money,
it offered us an inexpensive chance get away. The weather
was less than spectacular; cool, gray, and overcast.
Regardless, the majesty of the falls made up for less
than stellar climate. If you've never been to Niagara,
you will find it difficult to picture the awesome power
and overwhelming might of the falls. Even the bravest of
souls will feel a sense of queasiness standing just a few
feet away from hundreds of thousands of gallons of water
roaring hundreds of feet down into the misty pit below.
It matters very little whether the weather is damp or
not, because at Niagara, it's always raining. On the American side of the Falls are walkways bordered by aluminum handrails that allow you very close to the edge of precipice. Standing at the point where the Niagara River launches itself into mid-air and over the falls, Beth and I were admiring this powerful display of God's creation. What happened next I can only liken to one of those slow motion sequences from a movie where ten rapid-fire events occur in a split second of time. As I looked down to my right, I saw a young girl with one of her bare feet hooked around the mist-soaked aluminum rail and the rest of her body dangling precariously over the edge of the cliff. She was completely on the other side of the railing and only inches from a 500+ foot, straight down drop. What was she doing there, you might ask? Picking a weed. That's right, she was trying to pluck a wild flower that was growing out of the rocks on the cliff. Now the jumble of thoughts that go through your mind in a situation like that are hard to recall. However, what I still remember to this day went something like this: "If I grab her ankle, will I startle her and send her plunging to her death? If I do nothing, will she lose her slippery hold and plunge headlong over the falls, leaving me agonizing for the rest of my life about having done nothing? Where in heaven's name is her mother, anyway?! And so on…" I chose the ankle grab. Reaching down, I locked on to her ankle with an adrenaline-assisted grip that super glue couldn't have equaled and mumbled some lame social amenity like "Little girl, I-I-I don't think it's safe to be out there…" As I pulled her back through the railing, she blithely reported "I REALLY wanted this flower. See, isn't it pretty?!" A moment later her mother came lumbering over wailing "Charlene, Charlene, now where on earth did you get to?", unaware that she had almost lost forever her momentarily misplaced offspring. Mother and daughter then went merrily on their way while I stood there with my heart in my mouth and my breakfast rumbling in my stomach ready to be launched, just like the waters of Niagara. You can probably see where this spiritual metaphor is going. How often do we allow the allure of sin's "pretty flowers" to draw us dangerously near the cliffs? Maybe the "poesy" is an intense relationship that feels "so right" but turns out "so wrong." Maybe it's a positive habit like diet or exercise that eventually develops into an eating disorder or a running addiction. Or maybe it's a job promotion offered in a such a way that you feel compelled to morally compromise your values and ethics in order to accept it. Whatever prize we stretch to snatch from the edge, we need to ask ourselves some key questions:
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| So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall! 1 Corinthians 10:12 |
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Please drop Tim a line at knapp@raex.com |
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