Freedom

With a third of my time here in Uganda already gone by, it was time for some rest and recuperation, thought it didn't come in the way I was expecting. Our scheduled retreat took us on a four-day trip to Jinja, a city in Eastern Uganda that prides itself in being the home of the source of the River Nile. We stayed at a Christian retreat center on the banks of the river, and at first glance the Nile seemed less like the river i picture baby Moses being shipped off in and more like something from the garden of Eden. The river is as wide as a lake, with cliffs surrounding either side covered in green. Even with your eyes closed the beauty that is found here can be realized when you hear the river's rapids, the various species of birds soaring over the water, the monkeys swinging from tree to tree, and feel the breeze as it beckons you to join in with the beauty.

I made a point to get up each morning to watch the sunrise. I hadn't yet truly experienced the famed African sunrise and where better to do it than along the historic Nile, where though civilizations have changed and developed over thousands of years, the same sun still rises? I crept out of my banda that morning with my camera, hoping to catch this rare beauty. After taking some photos I just sat and watched, absorbing the timeless tranquility around me, thinking about how the sunrise I was seeing was essentially the same seen by Moses or Cleopatra. As everything surrounding me became flooded with light, it seemed that time stood still in awe of the beauty of God's creation. I longed to be in it--to fly over it and to take it all in, if only there was a way.

And then I saw it. The bungee jumping platform in the distance. Some of my team members where planning to jump the next day before we went rafting, but I had never even given the possibility a thought. Of course I wasn't going to jump. I had no desire to, nor a good reason to, plus I would say that my fear of heights is up there with my fear of snakes. But in this moment of freedom, my desire increased at a rate faster than the Grinch's heart, and jumping off of that platform became a metaphor in my mind to the new found freedom that I was experiencing in Christ--a freedom that drives out all fear because of His unfailing love--a freedom that is new and exciting and mysterious. And it was a freedom that was beckoning me: "jump."

So I signed up to bungee jump. My team poked fun at me on the way there because I kept listening to a song on repeat on my iPod: "Brave" by Nichole Nordeman. Looking back it was funny, but the words were so true--of God, it says "you make me want to be brave." I walked with confidence up to the platform with the others, trying not to look down. I decided I wanted to go first--I couldn't give myself more time to dwell on the reality of the ridiculousness I was about to encounter. And as I stood at the edge, my ankles bound together and my toes dangling, the bungee master lowered my arms and began to count down: "three, two..."

As he reached "one", I remembered the words from the Nichole Nordeman song I had listened to on repeat just before: "if you believe in me, that changes everything."

And then I jumped.