Everybody, Always

jumped right out of my tennis shoes. No joke. Try doing that sometime.
It’s not easy, but it’s what it looks like to want to be with someone that
bad.
I was free-falling in my socks and laughed when I realized what I’d
done. After a long minute of free-falling, I reached behind me and pulled
on the hacky sack, the parachute came out, and I landed in a field near
Adam. He pretended he didn’t know me as I walked in my socks over to
the airplane after it landed to get my tennis shoes back.
I know a little bit more now what it feels like to be a father who wants
to be with his kids. Jesus did something a lot like what I did with Adam.
He jumped out of heaven to be with us.
I have been watching Adam for his whole life. I know all about Adam,
and he knows quite a bit about me. Still, there’s a big difference between
knowing what someone’s doing and being with them while they do it.
God knew we’d know the difference too. This has been the easiest way
for me to understand one reason that God sent Jesus to us. He wasn’t sent
because God was mad at us. He jumped out of heaven and came as
Immanuel because He wanted to be God with us.
I’ve taken plenty of bar exams in the course of my career as a lawyer
and have been licensed to practice law in quite a few states. Each of these
bar exams takes between two and three days depending on the state, and
they test everything you know about the law. By the end, your mind feels
like melted Velveeta because you’ve gone through more than thirty long
hours of testing. Guess how long the final test is while you’re free-falling
to get your skydiving license? Half a minute. No lie. All you have to do is
simply obey what you’re told to do for just thirty seconds.
Some people I’ve met who like Jesus a lot have told me they’re going
to do whatever He tells them to do for the rest of their lives. I think that’s
terrific. While I’d like to say the same thing with even half the
confidence they have, I just can’t. It’s easy to talk about big ambitions
you have for your faith, and theirs is certainly a beautiful one. I’ve started
a couple of diets this way on January first, but I didn’t make it as far as I