Follow Your Leash

Surfers know that when they see a set of waves coming in, they have to do the very thing they don’t want to do: swim toward the wave. As someone who has done some surfing, I can tell you that your first instinct is to run toward the shore. But you don’t want to do that. Instead, you need to swim toward the wave and try to go under it or over it.

But if you are paddling out and the wave picks you up, the worst way to go is backward, which I have done. You can get so disoriented that you don’t know which way is up. And more than one person has drowned because they didn’t know which way was up. They went down when they should have gone up, and the outcome was fatal.

So the best thing to do if you find yourself in this situation is to grab the leash that is attached to your ankle and pull on it. Then go in the direction of the leash. Why? That leash is attached to your board, your board is buoyant, and it will be on the surface. So even if it goes against the logic of the moment, follow your leash to the top.

In life, the Word of God is like that leash on a surf board. When we are feeling overcome by trials and difficulties, it will lead us to the surface where we can get the proper perspective on what is really happening. Your emotions, like whitewater, will get the best of you, and you will be overwhelmed. But when we hope in God and believe the Word of God, it corrects us.

We might get caught in another wave, and then another, but we need to keep hoping and trusting— again and again and again.