The Forrest Gump Of Christian Women

I am the Forrest Gump of Christian women; slow to learn, quick to leap, armed with a ton of good intentions and very little judgment.

Like Forrest, I’ve spent a good portion of my life wandering from one misadventure to another and have finally decided to go back home. Home to my Father, home to my faith. I have been a perpetual prodigal and I’m here to tell you-it’ll wear you out.

Like Forrest, I started my (Christian) life with a set of leg braces. His were made of metal, mine were made of sin. Unfortunately, it took me longer to realize that I could chuck ‘em. My braces weren’t made of the sin I bore when I first came to Christ-God yanked those off the moment I said, “Amen”. But, I fashioned myself some new ones, made of every sin I committed thereafter. The really strong parts were made of the sins and mistakes that I just kept repeating.

This would account for the fact that snails zipped right past me on the road to Christian maturity. It’s hard to get anywhere when you’ve got a few hundred pounds of metal attached to your legs. Oh, I tried to ditch the weight. Every time I flattened myself before God, recommitted myself and begged for forgiveness and revival, I’d get my screwdriver out and start to work. More often than not, before I’d even finished muttering, “lefty-loosey, righty-tighty”, I’d commit the same old sins, make the same old mistakes, toss the screwdriver and add a few more pounds to my burden.

As I said, like Forrest, I’m a bit slow to learn. I understood when the Bible said that Christ died to set me free from sin. I got that it meant I wouldn’t pay the price for my sin. I understood that it meant I was no longer a slave to sin, but had the power to escape it. What took me a while was understanding that when I did sin, I didn’t have to drag it around with me forever.

I spent too many years clumping along, not realizing that my legs worked just fine; I just had to ditch the braces.

Maybe you, like me, are a little on the Gumpy side. Don’t worry….God has classes for slow learners, too. He may even have a few things for us to teach.