As you get older and troubles threaten to sink you, let Christ be the ballast in your life, giving you stability through every storm.
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada and I’m already celebrating my birthday.
With another big birthday just a few days away, I’m proving those doctors wrong who said years ago, "Oh, she'll never make it into her 70s!" Well, here I am, breaking the statistics and getting ready to celebrate my 74th birthday! Whoa! Yet as amazing as that is, I’m not being careless; I’m aware that the mid-70s come with lots of problems that can cause anxiety. You know, I’ll hear someone talking about their osteoporosis and their bone mineral density, and I start thinking. Oh my goodness, my bones are very porous because I haven’t stood up in ages, and so, occasionally I wonder if and when I’ll break one of my already-fragile bones. I become fixated on cracking my femur or breaking my hip; all this, and I haven't even stubbed my toe!
Or I could get anxious about my compromised lungs – I'm still feeling weakness from the respiratory infection that landed me in the hospital earlier this year. And there are always concerns about my kidneys, given that I've worn a catheter for decades. Whether it's nasty bugs that harm the lungs or my kidneys, I have to be on guard against anxiety. So, I keep in mind the words of Jesus, recorded in John 16. He says, “In me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” And so, as I approach my 74th birthday, I am celebrating Jesus and his peace in my life.
And as I get older and fears about my disability threaten, I think of this great analogy from Eugene Peterson. He said, “All the water in all the oceans cannot sink a ship unless it gets inside. Nor can all the trouble in the world harm us unless it gets within us.” Isn’t that great? I mean we’re safe as long as we do not allow anxiety to get inside of us. Fear and worry cannot sink my heart, or submerge my peace of mind, or plunge my joy into a flood of despair if – if I do not allow these things to wheedle their way inside my heart. And to carry Eugene Peterson’s analogy a bit further, I like to think of Jesus as my ballast in the ship [now I should explain, the ballast is a heavy weight placed low in a ship’s hold to give it stability. When the ballast is secured down in the hull, it keeps the ship from tipping in a storm and taking on water]. So with Jesus as my ballast, residing deep in my soul, I’m not going to take on worry or anxiety. My life has stability. No amount of fear or anxiety can submerge me. As long as Jesus is the heavy weight in my heart, I am safe as I look towards the future. I have freedom as I look toward my birthday.
Speaking of which, I invite you to celebrate it along with Ken Tada and me. Because my husband and I are not slowing down. With both of us in our 70s? We are working hard to give the good news of Jesus to more people with disabilities than ever before. So, join in on the party! I’m inviting you to donate to my birthday, so that disabled people around the world can have a hope-filled future. Just go to joniradio.org for all the details. Like I’m asking all my friends, don’t send me birthday presents, just send the good news of Jesus to the world’s disabled, and do it by donating to my birthday at joniradio.org. Again, that’s joniradio.org.
© Joni and Friends