Bicycles… Cycling….
When you are slightly older and a bit overweight and you have a teenage son who is quite a bit more active than you, and you decide to do the father-son thing and go Cycling together for… togetherness…
You are soon hit with a really real, reality.
Hills.
My dad likes to say about flying: Takeoff is voluntary. Landing is mandatory… it’s the same thing.
If you go down a hill, you kinda need to go back up the hill if you want to sleep at home.
So the first endeavour up the hill was… challenging… Going down?
Awesome!
Wind blowing through your eyebrows, total freedom. 10 out of Ten! Can recommend! Coming back up… murder!
People were leaning on their fences like Auntie Stienie to see if I am going to make it past their property. The ADT security car was crawling up slowly, the driver preparing himself emotionally for the inevitable mouth-to-mouth re-sus that was surely about to happen! He could already see his medal and year-end bonus for saving my life!
Well… joke’s on him! I made it (yes I did almost die, yes I was ready to meet Jesus, and yes, I did curse the inventor of the bicycle just a little bit!)
Now, a few months later, I’m not afraid of that hill. It’s still a challenge, but nothing worth writing home about. The Hill was overcome!
Oddly. The hill is exactly the same as it was that first day. It didn’t get any flatter (“flat earth”, Bah!! ) and it didn’t get shorter. The only thing that changed was: Me. The hill didn’t change, I changed!
I came to that hill again a week or two after our first meeting and decided. I will beat this hill. And a month later, I did. I made a decision and stuck to it.
Now why this anecdote about my severely lacking fitness?
I have been challenged over the last couple of months and not being in the best of mind spaces and while in the shower I was talking to God and He said to me: “1 minute and change.”
I knew exactly what He meant because it’s something I used to do with my kids when they were little and having a meltdown. I used to tell them that I can see they are struggling and that they are allowed to be upset. Then I said they can have a minute to really grind those emotions as hard as they like. And then we are done with them and go on. Feel better? Yes? Ok let’s go do something creative!
God was giving me a minute. And then… Change. Change my mind.
Now Just in case you think this is unbiblical.
After mocking 400 Baäl Prophets, and making fun of King Ahab and Jezebel, Elijah Fled to Mount Horeb, and had himself a moment…
“He came to a broom bush, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life;…”
(1 Kings 19:4 NIV)
Twice God gave him food and rest (pro tip for all men!), and then God called him out. Elijah, change you head space, get your perspective right and lets get to work! There is a bigger plan than what you think or perceive!
The Bible is full of examples of how to refresh our thinking as a lifestyle,
”Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”(Romans 12:2)
…but more than that, Paul gives the same advice over and over (almost like he said it to himself in the mirror every now and again:
What you see and what you think and what you feel is probably not true. Take a minute, then change:
”We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
(2 Corinthians 10:5 NIV)
The message is really very loud and clear. What you are feeling right now, test it. What you are thinking right now? test it. How you are perceiving life? Test it!
”whatever is true,
whatever is noble,
whatever is right,
whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely,
whatever is admirable
—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—
think about such things.”
(Phillipians 4:8 NIV)
In other words… If your thoughts, feelings and emotions are not occupied by those things, then take a minute… and change.
Take your thoughts captive…
Take control of your mind. Stand up straight and smile. Look at it from a new angle and if it still doesn’t sit right with you, like with Elijah, choose your secret weapon: The unequivocal knowledge that even this, God will use for His Glory!!
1 Minute and Change. Make it a motto and Mantra in your life because your next hill, is literally just over this hill …
😉
