Keep Paddling

I like safety.  I like properly-installed carseats, seatbelts, helmets, high fences, padded floors, hedged bets, back-up plans, and pretty much anything else that mitigates risk.  Somehow, my high school friends talked me into white water rafting in spite of my personal feelings;  I remember thinking it was a necessary evil on the way to an epic week of Young Life camp, and since I couldn’t find a way around it, I said yes.

The bus ride to New River Gorge was long, and we traveled through the night.  Someone got the great idea to watch The River Wild while we dozed; after all, it fit pretty perfectly with the theme.  One by one, my friends drifted off to sleep while I stared, in horror, at the tiny screen.  Meryl Streep’s abductor forced her to raft through enormous rapids, ending with what had to be a fifty-foot water fall.  No one bothered to tell me the rapids were computer-generated.  And no one was awake to reassure me that the New River was nothing like the movie.  For all I knew, my morning would include a fifty-foot freefall in a tiny inflatable raft.  I was terrified.

The bus ride into the gorge did not help one bit.  The aging school bus bounced and squeaked as it zig-zagged down the side of the mountain.  Each turn required the driver to stop on the edge of the cliff, back up until the back of the bus touched the mountain, then pull forward to the cliff again…an eternal see-saw that eventually enabled us to navigate the turn.  At any minute, the bus was going to hurtle hundreds of feet into the gorge below, bursting into flames on the way down.  I was certain of it.

And yet, we survived, and we were unloaded into a landing area where we put on lifejackets (thank goodness) and met our guides.  There I got another shock.  Actually, I got two.  First, our guide had approximately five teeth.  Total.  And second, the raft wasn’t exactly fitted with harnesses and safety belts.  In fact, we weren’t supposed to sit on the seats at all.  Five Teeth grinned and told us to perch on the sides of the raft, with our butts hanging precariously over the water below.  And we didn’t get to hold on; instead, we were told to jam our feet under the “seats” to anchor ourselves and devote both our arms to paddling.  Right.  I knew Five Teeth had been riding this river since elementary school, but I thought he was full of you-know-what.

Nevertheless, I only had two choices: take a solitary bus ride back to the top of the gorge and risk the falling off the cliff, or get in the boat.  Thanks to peer pressure, I got in the boat.  It was pleasant for approximately fifteen minutes.  The water was smooth and relatively shallow.  The only “rapids” were really just bumps here and there.  Five Teeth told me that the rapids in The River Wild were computer generated.  It felt like a canoe trip with padding.  I could get used to this, I thought.

Then I saw the first real rapid.  Angry white water swirled and gushed on either side of a twenty foot rock.  We had to choose our side, and Five Teeth screamed for us to steer to the right.  Frankly, the right didn’t look any better than the left, but steer we did.  Our boat hit the white water and the front flew into the air; the impact threw me off balance, and I did the only sensible thing to be done: I threw my paddle into the boat, put my head between my legs, and grabbed onto the canvas ties in the bottom of the boat.  Remember doing tornado drills in elementary?  That was my exact position. 

Thwack.  Five Teeth hit me in the head with his paddle.  I looked up, and we had passed the rapid.  “What are you doing?”  he yelled.  I thought the answer was pretty obvious.  “Your team needs you to paddle, and the force of your paddling keeps you balanced and in the boat.  You can’t just quit in a rapid; you put yourself and your team in danger.  You’ll get through if you keep paddling.” 

Just keep paddling.  I tried it on the next rapid, and you know?  It worked.  In fact, I sort of enjoyed myself.  I went rafting again the next summer, and again several years later as a Young Life leader.  I’m not saying I would sign up to go tomorrow, but I developed kind of a fondness for the whole adventure, even on the trip where we paddled through an electrical storm.  When you keep paddling, it keeps you upright on top of the water, most of the time.

This has a point, I promise.  This whole home-buying/home-selling/moving three states away thing is a lot like white water rafting without the smooth, placid parts.  We haven’t found a home we like and can afford in North Carolina.  We put our house on the market today and both showings rejected it.  We can’t afford to move if we don’t sell our house for a good price, but I don’t know what it would do to James if he had to turn down this opportunity.  We had a good weekend in North Carolina, exploring and finding new favorite spots, but three days later, we are no closer to knowing what to do next.

When the promised offer turned into not an offer, I threw down my paddle.  I lost sight of our end goal: a better life for our family.  I decided we’d just stay put in Kentucky.  I’ll teach for 38 years, James will hate his job forever, but at least we won’t fall out of the boat. We’ll stay in our lovely neighborhood with our remodeled kitchen and our great backyard and we’ll be safe.  Right?  I just don’t think that’s what God has for us, if I’m honest with myself.  Paddling means keeping my eyes on Him, turning my fears and hurts over to Him every single time, and expecting that He has plans to prosper us and not to harm us, even though today felt a lot like harm. 

I do not want to go through weeks and weeks of keeping our house clean for showings.  I do not want to get my hopes up again and again.  I am bone tired, but now is not the time to throw in the paddle.  I can't do this one my own, but how can God show up for us if we climb out of the river?