All Hands on Deck

Today’s meditation was the 5th verse of Psalm 139.

We Louisiana Methodists are preparing for Annual Conference and our Bishop Cynthia Harvey has asked us to study Psalm 139.

For me, this has meant tackling one verse, each day, in the days leading up to Conference.

Here’s the 5th verse:

You surround me—front and back.
    You put your hand on me. 

As a Dad, one of the most thrilling events you can witness is the moment your child successfully ditches the training wheels and learns to ride his bike.

During the process, I came to recognize that I had been using the universal method of teaching someone to ride a bike.

It goes like this – you grab the back of the seat, run along with them as they start and then, at just the right moment, you push your loved one down the street only to have them fall flat on their face.

Sounds fun, doesn’t it?

I’ve written about it before – unpacking the process of falling and getting up.

For whatever reason, this process came to mind during my meditation of verse 5.

No, not the falling on your face part – the holding of the seat part, that moment just before I would push my child down the street.

In that moment, wherever my child would lean, I was there to keep them from falling.

I would gently catch the bike and upright it, over and over and over again no matter the direction it was leaning.

This verse reminds me of that.

God ahead of me, behind me – ready to catch me prior to falling – God literally placing His hands on me.

Yesterday I wrote about how a relationship with God can help us seek forgiveness when we’ve said something hurtful or wrong.

That same relationship can help shield us when we are about to fall.

I’m not going to go so far as to say Christians have some sort of magical touch from God and that He somehow reaches down from the heavens to touch us and protect us from evil.

But I will tell you this – my relationship with Jesus has helped me deal with fear.

And it’s quite often fear that is the very thing that trips us into falling.

Whatever happens during annual conference for Louisiana methodists, my prayer is that the church can sustain and enhance the touch of God in the lives of Louisianians.