When You Feel 1 Foot Tall...

BLOG 2 in a 3 part, Saturday night blog extravaganza...

What do you do when you have one of those "I feel about a foot tall" moments in life? We've all been there - the times when you do something unintentionally that still makes you look and feel pretty terrible. I'm not specifically referring to sin here but rather those life moments when your human ability to do something kind of stupid comes to the forefront.

Trust me, I've been there many times in my 27 years. Recently, I had a "moment like this" (the opposite of that experienced by Kelly Clarkson) while playing a silly, multi-sport hybrid game called Whirleyball. If you've never heard of this, it basically consists of riding around in bumper cars and throwing a softball sized whiffle ball into a hole with a shortened Jai-Alai stick. If you don't know what Jai-Alai is, I don't know what else to tell you. We're already in a pretty obscure realm of sports here.

Anyway, since we were in bumper cars there was some bumping to be expected. I highlight SOME. At one point, a particular girl (who might be reading this if her back is healed) had a beat on the ball while heading towards a corner of the Whirleyball "rink." Seeing my chance to swoop in and play some defense, I slithered full speed ahead behind her towards the corner, the rest of the players approaching from a distance. I'm sure you see where this is going.

In a clash of perfect momentum that would make any high school Honors Physics teacher proud, my cart violently hurtled this girl's cart into the wall as she flailed helplessly like a crash test dummy. The look on her face was something along the lines of, "I don't know whether to be completely ticked off right now or just plain shocked." It was at that moment that I felt about 1/6th of my usual height, which is taller than 1/6th of most people's heights but pretty small nonetheless. Getting out of the cart and calling it a night was a serious option. This is to be expected, though, since I had just done something that was about one step removed from accidentally tackling a girl like a linebacker in a friendly game of Thanksgiving Day church youth group touch football.

Thankfully, we moved forward with the game and I was able to at least take momentary solace in the fact that her spinal cord did not dislodge from her back. Oddly enough, I scored the winning points as time expired but that's not really the point.

So, again, I ask: What do you do when you feel one foot tall? This is clearly just one example of this type of situation but a pretty good one. Just to get the "whirleyball" rolling, here is what I do. I'm open to new ideas.

One thing that helps is to laugh. No, I don't mean right at the moment. That's kind of difficult to accomplish when you feel pretty bad and several people are looking at you, mouths agape in general horror or with the thought (verbalized or not) of, "What's wrong with you?!" Seriously, though - seeing the humour or light side in our most unsmooth, poorly executed moments can give proper perspective to our imperfect human reality in light of God's amazing and eternal power, perfection and love. Easier said than done, but it's good to remember.

This reveals what I believe is the most important lesson: that God cares about you just as much in those dumb moments as He does in your good and triumphant moments. "How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And this is what we are!" (1 John 3:1a; NIV). I wonder how my life would be different if I were to consistently meditate on and apply this truth in all its implications that God really does LOVE me. How many things would not matter so much, even those moments that seem to matter so much?

To review and conclude: "...I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation [including those 1 foot tall moments], will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39). May you persevere through the good and bad life has to offer this side of eternity through the Lord's awesome love for YOU.