The Chair

I read a comment recently by Earl Palmer in The Presbyterian Outlook.
He wrote: "Do I dare to put my weight down upon the promises of Jesus?"

I heard something like that frequently when I was young.
The evangelists who came through town would try to explain what it means
to trust Jesus.
They would say, "Trusting Jesus is like sitting in a chair. You have to put your whole
weight down and trust the chair to hold you up."

I think it's a useful analogy.
It's a kind of passive activity.
You do something -- but the something is nothing.
You let yourself be held.

In daily life this is not easy to do.
It's hard to let go.
To completely let go.

As the man in Mark's gospel said, "Lord, I believe; but help my unbelief."
That's me.
That's most of us.
We believe; we trust; but we won't sit down--not all the way.
The miracle of grace is that the 'chair' (Jesus) is not pulled away from us--
it stays right there in place--waiting, just in case we do in fact sit down
and place our whole weight on it.

The good news is that we can sit down.
The chair will always be there.
Someday we will get tire and sit down.
God is patient.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whoever puts their whole on him will not wear themselves out,
but will have eternal life.