I once heard about an experiment done by some psychologists using the wall-eyed pike fish. They created a fish tank that was divided into two parts. The separator of the two parts was a sheet of glass, so it appeared to be all one big fish tank from the inside. On one side was the pike and on the other they placed minnows.
Minnows meant dinner time to the pike, but it couldn’t get at the little fish because of the glass divider. Time after time, the pike tried to get at the minnows, but it kept crashing into the glass plate, until it stopped trying. After some time, the scientists removed the divider, but by then the pike had become convinced that it couldn’t get at the minnows. They swam all around the pike, even bumping into its mouth, but the hungry fish wouldn’t try to eat them. It would starve to death because it believed the minnows were unattainable.
Sometimes that same sort of thing happens to you and I. Maybe we’ve tried to secure employment. We’ve applied time after time at various places without success until we’ve become persuaded that we can’t find work, and so we stop trying. Or, other times, we quit trying to do something out of fear.
For example: My wife, Connie and I won a free weekend of lodging and skiing at one of the lovely mountain ski resorts in Colorado. The first day out, we took on a slope a bit more challenging than we were used to. As we were about to enter a section somewhat steeper than we normally skied, we stopped to calculate how we would approach it. Just as we were stopping, Connie fell forward. It wasn’t a hard fall. She didn’t slide or tumble or anything, she just slowly fell forward. In that simple, quiet, virtually-stopped fall, she broke a bone in her ankle. She had to be helped down the mountain by the rescue team.
That simple break stole her confidence. Fear of breaking a bone again ruled the day for her. She never enjoyed skiing again. Fear dominated her ability to let go and be free on the slopes from that time forward. The result? She quit skiing.
In Romans 8:15, we are reminded that when we accepted Christ as our Savior, we were set free from the bondage that held us down in a state of fear. We received the spirit of sonship. Further, in Galatians 5:1, Paul says, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”
You and I don’t need to be captives to old, fear-induced limitations any longer. Christ came that we might be free. The Holy Spirit takes off the chains of our hearts and minds that have held us down. We are set free to soar as we never have before. God’s will for us is to live by faith and not by fear. By faith, we can face those failures of our past and try again. Because, in Him, we are more than conquerors.
If you’ve been down and out, look to Him, get up, face life, and try again. Your next effort might be the one to produce that new job you’ve been needing.
– Just a Thought Dale Fillmore is lead pastor at New Day Church.
