Going Up?

Larry Waters lived in Los Angeles, California. Every Saturday afternoon, Larry would go outside and sit in his lawn chair to enjoy a six-pack. After a while, though, in his boring subdivision with identical house after identical house packed together like sardines, he decided he'd shake things up a bit: "I know. I'll purchase some balloons and tie them to my lawn chair so that I can harmlessly float around about 100 feet over all the houses." He would purchase forty-five weather balloons, have them filled with helium, and tie them to his chair with the help from some friends.

Of course, the way to top off any event is to have a PB&J. So Larry went into his house, made a sandwich, grabbed the six-pack and a BB-gun. His reasoning for the BB-gun: one at a time, he'd simply pop the balloons when he was finished with his shenanigan. He climbs in, gives the OK for his friends to let go of the chair, and he's off -- not 100 feet, but 11,000 feet! You can't pop balloons when you're holding on for dear life! A pilot in a DC-10 *AIRPLANE* sees him and radios in for help.

As the air traffic around him is re-routed, Larry eventually has to stay in his lawn chair, 11,000 feet in the air, for four whole hours until the helium started to fade. Upon landing, a reporter among the police, ambulance, and sizeable crowd of spectators runs up to him with a microphone. "Were you scared up there," they asked. "Yep!" "Would you ever want to go through that again," came their second question. "Nope!"

There's an obvious lesson to be learned by this very true story. It's a reminder on how the average Christian dabs with things we know we shouldn't be doing. We may say, "Oh it's probably OK to do a little this and a little that. After all, I know myself, and I only want to go in at a 100 feet." You'll be at 11,000 feet before you know it and blindsided by what just happened -- again and again and again. We're like Larry, holding onto a little BB-gun thinking we have the situation all under control. And how many times do we find ourselves holding on for dear life as we go Up?