I borrow this title from an e-mail newsletter that my amazing mission president would send out to all of us each week. Each newsletter shared stories and experiences of success from across the mission that raised our expectations and built our faith. I will always be thankful for those inspiring messages and the good feeling I got from them.
Faith is one of those words that can provoke many different reactions from many different people. For some, it can be an over-used part of our vocabulary that has perhaps lost some of its meaning. For others the mention of it brings painful memories of other's hypocrisy into bitter focus. Faith is often a very big can of worms that people subconsciously know to avoid. I hope that by sharing this story I might share something about what that word means to me.
Many years ago, some friends and I went to Lake Powell. We had the special priviledge of having someone who worked there to guide us to all the best vistas. This was the first time that I went cliff-jumping. Our guide knew the areas that were safest for us to jump, and we enjoyed several 20 or 25 foot jumps.
I was under the impression that we had finished with cliff-jumping for the day when we came into a little cove and left the boat. I climbed up a little 5 foot ledge, and quickly noticed that my other friends were following me. Knowing how my friends usually like to see me pushed off the boat, I decided to retreat to higher ground with a few others who were already climbing up the rest of the cliff. About 60 feet later (or so I'm told) we arrived on level surface again finally. Looking down, I realized that there was no possible way for me to climb my way back down. The penny finally dropped--my group had been planning to jump from this particular ledge. Unfortunately, the ledge was not a friendly 90 degree angle--it sloped ever so gently into the abyss, where the cold, unforgiving water waited 65 feet below us.
The scene is burned into my memory. I remember marveling at how tiny the waves in the water looked from that height. Fortunately, we had not scaled the entire cliff, so I had some rock to hold on to. Usually I can handle heights, just as long there's a railing or a seat-belt or a safety certificate floating around somewhere. all I had unfortunately was my swim trunks. I clung to the cliff as a small infant would cling to his mother's leg, mouth closed in white terror as my eyes saw visions of myself tumbling off the cliff in a violent, painful horror leading to a particularly distasteful death. One by one my friends abandoned me as they flew off the cliff into the water, each landing in the water safely.
I knew that because the cliff was so sloped that if I were to jump, I had to fully commit to it. I could not half-heartedly make my way off my prison of rock, otherwise my hesitation would possibly bring to life my visions of tumbling against the rock on the way down. The words "paralyzed with fear" found new meaning in my heart as I stood there, glued to the rock. The guide saw the look in my eyes, and began coaxing me away from the cliff and into the water.
"You can do it, Mike. Just run off the cliff, straighten out your body on the way down, and don't look down."
He re-emphasized how he had been here before and knew that the jump was safe. Finally, after what seemed like half an hour of trying to gather up my nerves for the jump, I decided that if I could trust the guide, then maybe I could do it. Still gripped with fear, I robotically began making my way to the edge. My fear did not go away as I went off. My acrophobia fortunately ensured that I ran off the cliff at top speed, out of a desperate wish for the entire horrible episode to be over as quickly as possible.
I jumped, and after what seemed like a minute of free fall, I finally hit the water screaming like a little girl. I don't know how far into the water I plunged before I bobbed back up to the surface, wet and cold and giddy with the fact that I surivived!! I admit that it was unbelievably fun. I knew that I had just experienced perhaps the biggest adrenalin thrill my body had ever experienced--and never shall experience again, I silently promised myself as I swam back to the blessed shore.
God has a funny way of teaching us important lessons through parables, and I believe that he gives us teaching moments like these very often. Fortunately I had been praying for my dear sweet life throughout my cliff ordeal, so I think that God had an easier time of helping me recognize some things.
Every one of us at some point finds ourselves overwhelmed with fear. The threats of loss, pain, anguish, failure, rejection, and lonliness at some point find us in a very vulnerable place. The questions and doubts that come in these times can paralyze us and prevent us from taking action. A voice tells us that we will never survive the jump, that we will never be strong enough, that it is better to just give up. We may come to believe that all is lost, that we have made one mistake too many.
Satan wishes us to stay on the cliff. It's not surprising to learn that he is known as the "accuser" (Revelation 12:10). He accuses us of being too small, too weak, too unimportant to ever amount to anything. When we look at others, He tells us that we are too fat, too thin, too dumb, too nerdy to ever be accepted, and it is all our fault.
God is there to encourage us, to make us believe Him when He says that we can make it through. "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind" (2 Timothy 1:7). It is not in God's character to make us doubt ourselves--that's Satan's goal, who is the father of all lies (2 Nephi 2:18--from The Book of Mormon, Another Testament of Jesus Christ [elsewhere BoM]).
How can we find trust in God to jump off the cliff? Try getting to know him better. Read his words in the scriptures. Pray, just talk with him. Maybe you'll find significance in the fact that Christ has jumped your cliff before, and is familiar with the waters you are jumping into. "And he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities" (Alma 7:12, BoM).
When we do decide to make the jump, Satan will not stop throwing doubts and fears our way. "What if you forget all that you have studied?" "What if everyone finds out about what you have done?" "What if they abandon you?" "What if they laugh at you?"
When we decide to put our faith in God instead of ourselves, we can answer those "what-ifs" with our own: "What if God really will help me?" "What if now is the perfect opportunity?" "What if the only thing standing between me and my goal is my own fear?" "What if these doubts I have are completely baseless?" The only way you'll even find out the answer to those questions is to try, and make the jump anyway. And just as I could not jump off the cliff half-heartedly, we cannot half-heartedly excercise faith (pick and choose which commandments to obey) and still expect God's help: "For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think he shall recieve anything of the Lord" (James 1:6-7).
As I said, the word "faith" means many different things to many different people. For me, when I have faith in God, I feel empowered. I want to take action. I want live according to the spirit of the motto "Sieze the Day." When we have faith, we will wait patiently if need be, trusting that God knows the perfect time to help us when it will benefit us the most.
We can have faith in Jesus Christ. He is stronger and greater than any cliff we are called to jump off of. I testify that He does know the waters, and that when we do what little we can, He will make up for that great remaining sum that we cannot do, and we will arrive safely at our destination.
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