on the road

If you’ve ever been to Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington, Tx, you may have been on a ride called the “Runaway Mine Train”

This is a fun ride for everyone, but there’s this one part where the mine train goes into this saloon type thing. You see the manikins playing cards and whatnot, and you start gaining speed toward the back wall of this place. The first time you’re riding, it can startle you for a second, cause it would appear if you continue along your track, you’ll just crash right through the wall! At the last moment, the ride drops down and goes through a hole in the floor, and thus the crisis is averted.

Our instinct falls quite often on our own securities. Our job, our bank account, our position or status in our family, our circle of friends, or our church. We’re trained for our entire life to build up these fortresses that amount to our self worth, and that whatever comes to crash against the walls of our security better not be stronger than we are.

I feel like this line of thinking is a bit contrary to what Scripture teaches. Take… the guy who builds his house on the sand. You could build a stable, sturdy, house… but if it’s say… 30 feet from the beach… things could get messy, damaged, or broken. You could build a house out of steel and concrete… but if it’s on the mountain-side of an active volcano… chances are you could lose everything you’ve worked for.

Jesus tells this parable, like many others… to show that the point is not how smart, how great, how strong, or how successful we are, but rather that Christ is the only cornerstone on which to build any basis of life. We probably feel like we know this well enough, and we could confidently say we believe that… but yet our lives are filled to the brim with evidences of a lack of faith.

Like the Runaway Mine Train… we ride along feeling everything’s just fine… but when we see the tracks of our life running towards a wall, an epic crash… we struggle to find the steering wheel, or jump out of the car. At the time… in the moment of tribulation… this seems to be the best answer. Let me get out of this situation, at whatever cost… so that I can remain safe, secure, confident, and happy. How dangerous to think in such a way! Our eyes become fixated on the problem, and we fail to recognize the foundation we claim to have faith in.

The people at Six Flags Over Texas engineered that ride to take you safely under the wall, and never crash right into it. A first time rider may not know that… and that’s part of the excitement of the ride and all… but the thing is… at some point.. for our own health – our own sanity – we have to realize that the people that put that ride together have things under control.

Proverbs 16:9 says “In his heart, a man plans his steps. But the LORD establishes his way.”

This Scripture speaks volumes to every day of my life. Each morning, we have an idea of what we’ll do. Whether that’s work, what errands to run… or even on a broader scale… what we’ll when we finish this project, or in a year from now, what we’ll accomplish. Our sinful, misguided, selfish hearts lean on what we think is best. In good times, and in bad.

Christ desires most for our complete trust and dependence to be placed on Him. The parable of the rich young ruler is not primarily about money. The point Christ tries to make is telling this guy, “Whatever it is that matters most to you, that helps you sleep at night… give that to me. That’s the Kingdom you’re asking about.”

Does Christ ask all of us to give away every penny we have? No. But he certainly asked that guy. He knew the heart of this man. His heart leaned on all the riches he had accumulated. Everything else is his life would have pointed to the false Savior or religion. He tithed, kept all the commandments, was an all around good guy. But he never placed full security in Christ for His salvation.

That’s the danger. Christ holds it all together, not even on our best day does anything we amount to even come close. Colossians 1:17. “And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” Christ teaches throughout his entire ministry that life isn’t about what we accomplish along the way. Christ IS life. We either trust in that… or we run in fear to our own way of thinking, to avoid what seems to us to be an epic crash. Sometimes, though, God uses the crash, damage, struggle, and heartache to build a new temple.