Consistently and repeatedly.
Catchy little phrases that almost sing-song in our minds try to sway our mental powers to succumb and accept a fallacy as the truth.
But not today.
i'm here to challenge this bold faced lie...
Weebles do fall down.
That's right, Weebles, much like all other objects of mass, are subject to gravity. Sure, they're designed with marvelously round little bottoms that are weighted in such a way to keep them from tipping over, but they still fall down. If you don't believe me you can ask Theo... who may or may not have been victim to a Weeble air strike initiated by the large, toddling one. If Weebles somehow had the superpower to only wobble and never fall down, then my toes would be perfectly safe from the threat of those heavy little creatures falling out of one of the 7 secret hiding spots in the Weeble tree house that i'm simply trying to put away... chubby little ninjas. And for the record, gravity also applies to that large Weeble tree house. Maverick (who is obviously freakishly strong for a 14 month old) proves this daily as he wanders around the living room carrying said tree house.
So no more buying the lie! No more repeating the catchy genius marketing chant of "Weebles wobble but they don't fall down." They DO fall down. If you would like to cheer Weebles as having the ability to wobble but not tip over, by all means, go right on ahead. For that is fairly accurate.
After all, why are we as a society placing such a burdensome expectation on these brightly colored figures? Why is not falling down something to celebrate? As a parent i think it would be kind of frustrating to new walkers if their toy were to somehow resist the fall that they took while carrying it. Weebles would be levitating, smiling-faced taunters to all children learning how to walk if they in fact never fell down.
Falling down is a necessity. If we allow ourselves to wrongly think that Weebles have reached the level of never falling down, we may start to expect the same for ourselves and others. This would be tragic. For how could our babies learn to walk? How could dances be perfected? How could the sport of diving or pole vaulting continue? Fear of falling would make soccer players dull and diminish tackling to a long, pointless game of chase, where no one is running too fast to risk it. Baseball jerseys would stay clean, circus acts would never be attempted, jousting would disappear, and no one would understand the game of rugby. (OK, that last one may not have anything to do with falling... rugby is borderline impossible to understand.)
And how harmful would this standard of perfection be if it were translated into more than just physically falling? Can you imagine if we all decided that wobbling in our thoughts, emotions, words and character was acceptable as long as we never fell... Expectations like this would eliminate our freedom to confess, increase hypocrisy, encourage escape instead of dealing with our actual struggles... And that would be terrible.
For if we can't fall then we can't
be broken...
be humble...
confess...
mourn...
be weak...
be weary...
be undeserving...
be contrite...
worship...
... and therefore we miss out on the blessings of
being close to God (Psalm 34:18)...
being lifted up by God (James 4:10)...
being forgiven (1 John 1:19)...
being comforted (Matthew 5:4)...
experiencing the power of God (2 Corinthians 12:9)...
finding rest for our souls (Matthew 11:28)...
receiving salvation through grace (Ephesians 2:8-9)...
repentance (2 Corinthians 7:10)...
laying what we have at the feet of Jesus and receiving all of Him (Revelation 4:10-11)...
... and what is life if we miss all that?
So let us free the Weebles from the torture of the expectation to never fall and may we find the grace to join them in that freedom.
Love.
ReplyDelete