You Can Jump In –By Pastor Eric Johns
“I Am” lyrics by Judah Akers from his Album “7”
Confession: the choice to trust that Jesus actually knows better than I do has been more difficult than I have preferred as of late. In my household, we are coming up on a year of homeschooling all 4 of our children, a year of my dear wife being without work, a year of what felt like a new normal getting flipped on its head. A year! I’m pretty sure I have fallen into the trap that I know better than Jesus about these things. Like, there is no way that Jesus thinks I have any business homeschooling 4 children for a year…that’s craziness! Yet, the choice to trust is the constant invitation Jesus calls me to.
So, for this past year, I’ve been making that choice to trust. Some days it’s an easy choice, other days, meh?!!
I’ve been listening to a lot of Judah Akers’ new album “7.” It’s sooo good!
There is one song in particular that I find I’ve been starting my mornings off with…it’s called “I Am” and it’s written from the perspective of Jesus speaking to me.
Part of the lyrics says “sometimes trusting me looks like a freefall…but either way I hope that you jump right in.”
Jumping. Takes commitment. Takes courage. And sometimes it takes putting all those things that I think I know and leaving them on the proverbial pool deck and just going for it! And yet jumping is hard, it’s scary, and it most often goes against the self-preservation instinct going on inside me. I don’t like feeling out of control.
But here is where my confession might turn towards some encouragement for you…when I make that choice to jump, to jump into trusting Jesus over myself, I receive the gift of the person of Jesus and everything he is about. It becomes about who I’m jumping towards. Picture the image of a Father treading water in the deep end of a pool with his arms poised and ready to receive the jump of a scared little kid who may not know how the jumping act will end, but knows 100% who will be there as he does! I can jump because I know Jesus, the most full reflection of His Father in Heaven.
And when I am reminded of my true Father in Heaven who says “you can count on my peace because I AM, who I AM…a God who is with you and for you always!…when I remember that, that is when I can feel my feet leave that pool deck.
Those lyrics go on to say,
“Sometimes my love looks like the sea and you just cannonball But either way I hope that you jump right in
Let my peace you can’t comprehend take over your heart.”
I don’t know where you find yourself coming up on this year of crazy, but I want to remind you, whether it’s the first time you’ve heard it, or the hundred and first time…you can trust the one you’re jumping to! So even if you’re a little scared, or even if you don’t understand the “why” of what’s going on around you…it will be okay…jump!