I recently had a battle going with my daughter. She had learned to ride bike, she was still shaky, but she was getting better every day. She wanted me to put her training wheels back on.
I didn't understand why she didn't want to just take off and pedal now that she could. She wanted the security of those training wheels back, life was easy with them. She didn't have to pay that much attention, less was required of her. Now that she knew she could ride without them she seemed to regress. She was able to go so much faster, turn quicker and go places those old wheels wouldn't have allowed. It was everything she had been wanting, yet somehow the comfort of those old training wheels pulled her back, she wanted that security back.
Well, I find myself frequently putting my training wheels back on too. Growth and change can be so hard. I find myself running back to the comfort of all those things I wanted so badly to be free of.
I convince myself it's OK to hang onto them, after all, I can ride that bike without the training wheels. It seems so simple when I think of my growth like my kid riding bike. It's just silly to keep trying to cart around with those old training wheels. There is so much more I can do without them. I can go so much faster and further.
Training wheels are a lot easier to take off though. It's also easy to recognize when you've put them back on. My life is not so simple. It's difficult to see when I slip back into my old ways of thinking and acting.
Lord Jesus, Help me to stop reaching for and thinking about those old training wheels in my life! Open my eyes so I recognize when I'm holding onto those old chains, when I am tying myself back up.
Hebrews 12:1-2a
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith."
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