New ventures
Two hours a week are usually reserved for my physical therapist. I am very grateful that she comes to my home for this.
One January morning while I was lying on the couch during my treatment, my gaze wandered out of our living room window through the cherry tree onto a Himalayan cedar tree behind it. I was taken aback and took another closer look. There was indeed a large something sitting on the top of the cedar tree, way above the ground. I tried hard to see what it was. A gray heron! A gray heron was sitting at the very top of the tree! I had to smile because it looked really funny how the big bird was trying to keep its balance on the not-so-stable upper branch of the tree. It kept swaying back and forth in an attempt to find a safe position on the tree. I quickly realized what the large bird had set its sight on: our garden pond where a native fish species had settled. As gray herons are very cautious birds and immediately flee at the slightest danger or movement, this visitor had preferred to first observe and scout the surroundings from a safe height. The desire for breakfast was probably great, but the caution and fear of potential danger was greater.
Maybe you’re like this bird. You have a goal in mind. There may be something you want to do or change. You know exactly what it is – it may even be a lifelong dream. But you hesitate. You’re afraid to take the next step, the first step. Too much is at stake. You’d rather sit at a safe distance for the time being, even if your current path is “wavering” and you’re no longer really good walking on it. The uncertainty and fear of what this new path might entail hold you back. Scenarios arise in your mind’s eye that send you into a panic. These are usually questions like: What will this or that person say if I take this step? What if I fail and realize afterwards that this new path isn’t so great after all? Do I really want to give up the acquaintance of the old way? And, so you sit on your “cedar” and looking longingly at the new that could be, but you don’t dare to set off.
At some point after a while, he took the plunge: I saw the gray heron fly past and it probably landed on the edge of the pond (which I couldn’t see from my lounger).
I hope that you and I also have the courage to try something new and leave behind old things that may have been good for a long time but are no longer suitable. To dare to take the first, courageous step. And I hope that we will discover on this new path that God is still holding our hand, never leaving us.
Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.
See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
Isaiah 43:18+19 (New International Version)
