With Just a Sling and a Stone

It's finally here. Worlds. I've been talking about it for some time now and it's currently staring me in the face. I leave tomorrow and in 3 days, I'll be competing at one of the most prestigious Jiu Jitsu tournaments in the world. Hence the name.

I signed up about a month ago because I hadn't registered for another competition in time. I thought that my team would be going to World's and I'd have an opportunity to prove myself at a high level tournament. It turns out that it's just me and 3 other team mates. The past few weeks have bee torturous - partially because I haven't had the mind set nor motivation to train - but also because I am scared stiff. Some of these competitors have been training for months for this event. They've cut weight, they've conditioned themselves - it's a big deal to them! I've been a Blue Belt for less than 6 months - some of them may have been Blue Belts for years, if not close to Purple Belts. I know the competition will be rough. You might say I'm a little nervous.

But as I sat down with my first cup of coffee this morning, I was immidiately reminded of the story of David and Goliath. The story starts out on the battlefield. The Israelites have been fighting the Philistene army. For forty days, the army of Israel had been taunted by the Philistene champion, who just so happened to be a 9 foot giant. No one from the Israelite army was willing to step forward to fight him. The Israelite king offered his daughter for marriage and tex exemption for the rest of the volunteer's life. Even that could not tempt anyone to take up arms against the Philistene. Then come David - a mere shepherd boy - with no combat experience whatsoever. But what he did have was a strong faith in the Lord who had already delivered him from the hands of a bear and a lion when the had come preying on his flock. So he volunteers to slay the giant. He refuses to wear armament. He uses the weapons he is comfortable with - a sling and 5 stones. What amazes me are the words David says the the giant on the battlefield: "45 Then David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword, a spear, and a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have taunted. 46 This day the Lord will deliver you up into my hands, and I will strike you down and remove your head from you. And I will give the dead bodies of the army of the Philistines this day to the birds of the sky and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, 47 and that all this assembly may know that the Lord does not deliver by sword or by spear; for the battle is the Lord’s and He will give you into our hands.”

All of us face our own personal Goliaths at some point in our lives. They vary in shape and size, but the idea is all the same. The difference is how we approach it. Do you stand before it, quaking in your boots (or in my case today, flip flops)? Or do you stand resolutly, with just a sling and a stone, knowing that you're fully backed by the strength of the Almighty?

While this tournament is most certainly not a life or death situation, it's a cause of worry, fear and all other sorts of emotions that have no business being with me. So today, I choose to be resolute. I choose to step on those mats knowing that He's gotten me this far in Jiu Jitsu. That it's by the talents and gifts He has given me that enable me to compete. I've got my sling and I've got my stones. I'm ready.