Stability Balls and Answered Prayers

So this year I jumped on the “get in shape” bandwagon and my New Year’s Resolution was a healthier lifestyle (which, by the way, I’m totally rockin the casa on). So I bought one of those big rubber stability balls to help me get in shape.

First of all, I would like to note for the record that these so-called “stability balls” can truly be described only as “fall on your giant-out-of-shape-butt" balls. If you have ever used one of these things, you would agree that these suckers are anything but “stable”. My first exercise was to sit on top of the thing and do a sit up. Seems easy enough. So I sit on top, cross my arms over my chest, start to lean back, and before I know it, I’m upside down on the floor and the ball is chasing Duncan across the living room. But I am determined to get in shape, so I try again. Second try, I manage not to fall off (score one!), however I discover my true wimpiness (strike two!)...I can’t even do a full sit up! My muscles simply don’t work, and I only make it like half way up. But I am determined, so I do as much as I can.
So the next exercise is push ups. These are the same as regular push ups except that your hands are on either side of the ball instead of the floor. I quickly find my push up arms more resemble that of a newborn horse just learning to walk than actual push ups. And once again, before I know it, the ball has quickly rolled our from under me and I’m munching on linoleum. I swear I hear that dang ball giggle as it rolls away. But nothing can stop me and my quest for health!
And this seems to be the theme of my work out plan…make feeble attempts at what I think is probably cake for most anyone else, and end up backwards and upside down, but getting up and trying again every time.
I discovered that less than a week later, I’m easily doing 40-50 crunches and pushups and all kinds of other little exercises on that sucker! Now I am supremely impressed with my extreme physical prowess, as all should be, and I don’t intend on quitting!

On a totally unrelated note (but watch me tie them together!) I was recently offered a job at the church, which is a totally answered prayer as I’ve been unemployed for the last 3 months, applying to everything I can find, wondering what exactly my next career step should be. I looked for theatre jobs as well as corporate jobs here in Texas, wondering if God was calling me to a new field. I looked in New York too, wondering if it was time for me to finally move, a step I’ve dreamed of my whole life. I wondered if God was asking me to give things up…and if so, would it be my dream of moving to New York, or the things I love in Texas...the best church and the best friends I’ve ever known.
It’s funny…for the last 2+ years, I’ve known I would leave this church and my friends and family and move to New York eventually. And for the last 2+ years, I wondered how I would ever say goodbye to the people who mean more to me than anything else. Well it turns out I got my answer…I can’t. At least not yet, and I accepted the job at Fellowship Church! Turns out that my God is a faithful God, one who knows me better than I know myself and knows where I will be happiest. And right now, it’s right here! Turns out that my God has a plan for my life that I can’t analyze or try to predict, but rather roll with and find out small pieces of his plan when the time is right. I hope that New York is not totally out of the picture, but just on a later page in the scrapbook. But what I do know already is that this job is the perfect place for me now and I am so stinkin excited to get started!!

What does this have to do with stability balls, you ask yourself. Well, get ready for this...just when you think your on top of your game, just when you think you’re on top of your world with everything figured out, just when you think everything in front of you is cake and you’ve got it in the bag, suddenly and before you know it, everything is pulled out from under you and you’re on the floor, upside down and backwards and you never even knew it was coming. But here’s the important part… if you’re going to accomplish what you set out to do, you have to have the strength to get back up and try again. You have to have the courage to look that dadgum stability ball in the eye and say it’s you or me sucker and I ain’t losing! And you have to have the faith in yourself that you can do it, and trust in the faithful God that will come thru just like he said he would.
And that, my friend, is all you need to know about stability balls and answered prayers.