Your Biggest Fan

I went to my first collegiate gymnastics meet yesterday. The meet was held at the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh. My wife Julie was an All-American on the National Championship Team at UW-Oshkosh in 1986. Her love for gymnastics has been a lifelong pursuit and together we as a family had the pleasure of watching this women's conference meet that had eight teams from Wisconsin competing.

There are four events that are involved in the competition...
1. The Vault
2. The Uneven Parallel Bars
3. The Floor Exercise
4. The Balance Beam

The atmosphere in the arena was electric! Two thousand fans filled the arena with each fan proudly wearing their colors and clappeing and yelling and hooting and hollering for their team. We were rooting for the UW-Oshkosh Titans in their yellow and black leotards.

All four events were going on at the same time. It was difficult to keep your attention on only one event at a time. As soon as your attention was affixed on one competitor all of a sudden you would hear a roar for another competitor on another event.

All of the gymnasts did exceptionally well. As in any competition there were moments of brilliance and there were moments of broken hearts.  Having only watched gymnastics on TV during the Olympics I noticed one distinct difference during this meet.

At each event, not more than ten feet away, the rest of the team, all 19 other women stood behind a yellow rope in a designated area. They were bunched together forming two rows of the competitor's biggest cheerleaders. As each woman competed the team would jump up and down, yell, scream, applaud and offer encouragement.  It was amazing. You could see each woman gaining confidence during the event as the roar of the fans, the roar of the team would build. And then at the end of each routine there is always the final run or the final dismount.

Each dismount or final flip or twist lasted less than a second (I timed them). And in that one second, the anticipation, the collectively held breath, the moment between heartbeats felt like the worlld came to a stop before the gymnast completed the final move in her routine. And in the blink of an eye the whole team would erupt in cheering, applause and mobbing their teammate as she ran toward them.

I was moved to tears more than once during the meet.

My iWitness...
I was more aware than normal at just how "alone" each competitor was on their respective event. Alone in the sense that although there were cheerleaders and fans on the near sidelines and in the stands, out there on the event the competitor stood all alone. Everyone saw their every move, their every misstep, their perfect tumbles, the loss of the grip of the bars resulting in a belly flop on the mat below. Everything was out in the open for everyone to see.
What if life was like that?
What if 2000 plus people saw your every move?

Two quick observations...

1. We can all be encouragers, cheerleaders and roaring teammates for the people in our lives as they live out their lives on the Balance Beam, the Bars, the Vault and the Floor.

2. There is one and only one who sees all. All the moves. All the missteps. All the mistakes. All the milestones. All the moments of success and failure.
And here is the good news... He's your biggest fan!!

And that's my iWitness...
Laugh often and Fear not!
David!

"Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing."
 (1 Thessalonians 5. 11)