You can do this...

Her name is Amelia.
She is twelve years old.
Amelia is from the Garden State of New Jersey.
Everyone around her was standing up.
She wasn't budging from her seated position.
The crowd of nine people around her were all on Stand Up Paddle Boards for the first time, except for the instructor named Jean.

We started off kneeling on our ten foot long boards to gain confidence that we could actually stay on top of it without falling over.
With everyone kneeling we paddled our way out into the channel where deeper waters awaited us.
By the time we hit the channel we were all standing...
Except Amelia...

Frozen by fear her bottom end was cemented to the board and she was unwilling or unable to stand.
Our wonderful guide and instructor sidled up beside her and began coaxing her with these words...

"You can do this..."

Jean must have said it twenty times in a two minute period.
Slowly, ever so slowly, with the voice of Jean sweetly, politely, firmly repeating, "You can do this..." Amelia went from sitting to kneeling to up on all fours to up on all threes until she made the last move which allowed her to be up on all twos.

And with that the surrounding crowd, myself included began to clap and whoop and holler words of congratulations.

Amelia did something she didn't think she could do...
All because someone took the time to believe in her and whisper...

"You can do this..."

My iWitness...

I don't know the man's name but he had been an invalid for 38 years.
He sat by a pool called Bethesda and believed that if someone would put him in the pool when the waters stirred that he would be healed.

Jesus came along and took in his situation and asked him the simplest, stupidest and yet most profound question...

"Do you want to be healed?" (John 5. 6)

The question could mean several things...
1. Hope that your situation could improve!
2. Somehow, some way you have been taken care of by others for 38 years. If you are healed you will now have to take responsibility for yourself and for your life. That will be a drastic change to your current lifestyle. Do you want to be healed?
3. Perhaps this is Jesus' way of saying, "You can do this..."

I see this all the time out on the tennis court as a microcosm of life itself.
A fellow player will complain... "My backhand slice is terrible."
Inside my mind the question arises... "Do you want to be healed?"
Are you going to do anything that helps that backhand? Are you going to take a lesson? Are you willing to give up your old habits to try something new to enjoy the game better? Are you willing to get out and for hours hit on the ball machine perfecting a new stroke altogether? Do you want to be healed?
Or do you just want to "sit by the pool hoping that somehow and some way the backhand slice will magically get better on its own?"

And so it is with life...
You are stuck in a rut at work...
Your relationship is as stale as 10 day old bread...
The bills are higher than the checkbook...
Life has not turned out like you thought it would...
Friends are flakier than the corn flakes in your cereal bowl...
You wonder if things will ever change...

Do you want to be healed?
There is life on the other side...
Jesus left us a helper called the Holy Spirit who whispers in our ears everyday...

"With my power... You can do this..."

Just to let you know...
I'll be standing there with you, applauding, clapping, whooping and hollering for you when you're ready to stand up and paddle!

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