Reflections from the Street

The strangest thing about my motorcycle wreck was the moment when I realized I am not on the bike any longer. I'm on the road. I'm sliding across the pavement. And coming toward me (or more likely I'm coming toward what I see) ... is an Ambulance.

I remember thinking to myself, "Wow, that is a really fast response time. These guys are good! I'm still sliding and here they are!"

Now to fully appreciate that moment, you need to be able to visualize what I was seeing. At this moment in my life everything horizontal had become vertical. (If you can't figure out what I mean, lay your head on the floor and look out in front of you-and you'll see that everything around you, which once had been horizontal is now vertical.

Now the reality is the Ambulance wasn't "uber fast". They were just returning from a previous run and were on their way back to the station. They just happened to have a front row seat for my motorcycle acrobatics.

As I'm skidding across the blacktop, seeing this vertical visual of an ambulance coming at me with lights on, all I can think is "I'm in the middle of the road. I better get out of here before someone runs over and me and I really get hurt."

So...still unable to breathe as the wind was knocked out of me, I get up and start crawling.

The truth is we are all out there "crawling in the middle of the street, and if we are not careful we'll get hurt."

That is especially true if you do not live with the awareness that at some moment in your life, everything that is horizontal will suddenly turn vertical.

You see, so much of what we "worry about" in life, so much of what we pray about in life, so much of what we struggle through in life-is all horizontal. It is the stuff of this world and this life here and now.

But in a moment, none of the horizontal stuff is going to matter when life gets turned on it's head and only the Vertical of life matters.

The Bible puts it this way in 2 Corinthians 5,  9 So whether we are here in this body or away from this body, our goal is to please him. 10 For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. We will each receive whatever we deserve... 

It is in that moment that EVERYTHING goes vertical. Nothing horizontal will matter anymore.

Today as you pray, look at the things you pray about (do you have a journal, or a list? It's a great way to keep up with your prayers). What do you pray about that is really Vertical? How much of your prayer life is still focused on the horizontal?

What would it take to "turn your world upside down", so that your prayers focused on the right things?

This is the second reflection from the street.