Knees Down

John and I are in Florida getting ready to leave for a cruise. Yes, I know, I’m spoiled. We are looking forward to having a few days to rest and relax OUTSIDE. I just hope I don’t blind anyone with my Casper the Friendly Ghost, white body.

After we arrived last night we went to the hotel restaurant for dinner. The bus boy that served our table, Jean (think French pronunciation,) is from Haiti. He’s an American citizen now but grew up in Haiti and still has family there. Things were a little slow in the restaurant so he had plenty of time to talk and we had plenty of time to listen. I love to hear other people’s stories. Though we both spoke English there was still a bit of a language barrier, but we muddled through.

As it so happened, Jean was in Haiti visiting his mother when the devastating earthquake hit in January. I asked him if he was afraid and he told us that he started to feel the earth shake and looked at his mother wondering what was happening. Her immediate response was “KNEES DOWN!” and with that they fell to their knees to pray. His prayer? “Lord, you give and you take away.”

Wow! I’d like to tell you that when something is going wrong in my life my very first thought is “knees down” but the truth is that I usually try to muddle along by myself for a bit. Why do I do that? It’s not like I’ve ever successfully gotten myself out of a tough spot. Eventually I figure out that God is bigger and smarter than I am and I give the control of my life over to Him . . .again. One of my favorite Bible verses is 2 Corinthians 12:9, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” What a great verse! God says to us, “Hey, I love it when you are weak and can’t see your way out of the dark hole. That’s when I do my best work. Let me have your fear, your troubles, your pain and watch me do my stuff.”

I always want to be a “knees down” person. I want to watch God work. I know He’s incredible. He’s proved it over and over.