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Are You Still Hanging on a Limb?

by Todd Horne  
9/22/2010 / Christian Living

I was reading Ephesians 1 this morning. As I meditated on God's Word, I was setting my heart and after a few minutes was allowed to literally tune in to a bit of wisdom that I believe God wanted me to share with You today.

According to Ephesians 1, God Himself grants us His incomparably great power. Did you get that? God gives us His power. The one condition God places on this grant is: if we would only believe.

Pardon the interruption, but this reminds me of a joke. I grew up in Southern Louisiana and as a child I went to Sunday school and church at a Southern Baptist church in Baton Rouge where the preacher did not mind revving up the decibel level and hurling some fire and brimstone from the pulpit with startling regularity. I can imitate him to this day quite well. When I do, it scares the living you know what out of the neighborhood kids and embarrasses my daughter to no end. Fun stuff! Anyway, I'm going to attribute this story to my old Southern Baptist screamer, although that might not be wholly accurate. For some reason, though, I've always associated it with him in my mind. I was about 8-years-old the first time I heard the joke and it always resonated with me, especially when I see people gloss over God's Word with religious insensitivity or the approach that they know-it-all like they are some sort of Pharisee, as if that is something to be proud of.

So the story goes, the town drunk is in attendance at the neighborhood's holiday picnic down by the river. After imbibing a few too many community consumables and taking a few too many nips from his own tuck, the now inebriated man saunters away from the townsfolk and disappears down a winding trail, heading off deeper into the woods. Before too long, he stumbles, loses his balance, and falls head first off of a very high cliff. As he is falling to his certain death, he reaches out and just happens to grab a hold of a tiny lone branch that is barely jutting out from the mountainside.

Amazingly, after free-falling a hundred feet or so, the old man is now quickly sobered and aware of both his dire circumstance and his apparent great fortune. His life has been spared. If only temporarily. One glance around and he realizes the ground is still several hundred feet below and that there is no other route to safety. He is hung out to dry on the proverbial limb. And he knows it. With literally no where to turn, the old man begins to plead for his life, crying out to God at the top of his lungs.

"Oh God!!!! Oh God!!! Please, Please! Oh God!"

When suddenly, he hears a voice.

"Yes, this is God! What do you want?"

Immediately, the old man begins to plead for his life, promising to atone for all of his past mistakes in life by never, ever drinking again, and by doing all kind of other meaningless, merit-based acts if only God rescues Him from this obviously deadly situation.

Never one to waste an opportunity at true salvation, God jumps right in qualifying the heart of his prospect.

"Do you believe that I am the one and only God, the creator of everything that is, was and shall be? That I am the Alpha and Omega?"

"Oh yes. I do. I do. I believe."

"Do you believe that I led Israel out of Egypt and to the Promised Land, performing many miracles in the process including parting the Red Sea and letting my people pass through?"

"Absolutely, I believe. Yes, yes I do," the old man cried in the most convincing voice he could possibly muster as he hung tightly, gripping that branch with everything ounce of strength he had, trying not to look down.

"Do you believe that I sent to Earth my only begotten Son, Jesus, and whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life?"

"Oh yes. Yes I do. I believe in Jesus. I do."

"You believe?"

"I believe!"

"You believe?"

"I believe!"

"Then let go of that limb . . .

"Sh$%#"

The old man would have nothing of it. Even though he had reached the end of himself and had no where else to turn, there was no way the old man could see himself letting go of that limb.

I never heard a proper ending to this story. I assume like all great works of literature, we are left to our own inner proddings and contemplations to come up with and debate the most likely conclusion.
For what it's worth, I believe that old man spent at least several more minutes hanging on the limb in stone cold silence, by himself, begging for God to grace him with his presence again. God, of course, would have returned over and over again, but eventually the man would have to believe enough to trust God with his whole heart and let go of that limb. Or, either he would never trust God and die holding onto the limb. Clearly, the only hope of a future for the old man rested with God and his believing in Him.

In Ephesians 1, the power God has already granted to you and me is the same mighty strength God Himself exerted when He raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now, if God can raise the dead, then it is clearly obvious that He has all the power you and I need to live victoriously over every stronghold! Fear, Oppression, Anger, Depression, Poverty, Addiction, Lust of the eyes, Lust of the heart, and anything else that we are confronted with in life, simply does not stand a chance if we will . . . if we will only believe.

Our problem is trust, or a severe lack of it.

See, it's like this: we can't see God and we can't see His power, at least not concretely, not with our eyes. We've all heard the saying that seeing is believing, haven't we? How then can it be that God, who has equipped us with eyes to see, can actually instruct us as believers to forego the information this sight reveals to us in exchange for information that we cannot physically see?

So, I asked God that very question. God, I said, why don't you make it easier on us and let us use the eyes you have given us to see what it is we need to see in order to more easily believe in what you want us to believe?

It made a lot of sense to me. I actually thought I was on to something.


God . . . well, He just sort of looked me up one way and down another, taking me all in. Then, God told me to "Let Go of that Limb!"

Todd Horne is a husband, a father, a writer, editor and publisher. He lives in Southern California with his wife and daughter and is a member of Crossroads Church. Todd publishes http://www.DerDiZ.com in his free time.

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