Born and raised on the small island of New Zealand, Marjorie and her sister Lala were Kiwis. Like most Kiwis they were enculturated with the belief that in order to fully live, a person must travel. While most of their contemporaries headed to Australia, this pair of sisters decided to go big. They scrimped and saved until they had enough money to get tickets to the United States. Once they arrived they had no money and no formal plan of how their trip would play out.
As with all of us, their most valuable possession was their faith in themselves.
They sang in bars and on street corners. They swept floors, cleaned toilets, and slept in their crappy car, or on the floors of friends they collected along the way. They town hopped across the US going from one city to another never knowing where their next meal would come from, who they would meet, or what the day would bring. The lived on pure faith and experienced the type of freedom that is only available to those who have every expectation everything will work out just fine.
My father is a Presbyterian minister. You may think my favorite song about faith would be a church hymn. Far from it. My favorite song about faith is The Devil Went Down to Georgia by The Charlie Daniel’s Band. In case you are unfamiliar with this classic song allow me to enlighten you. It is a story about the devil being behind on soul collecting….
When he came across this young man
Sawing on a fiddle and playing it hot
And the Devil jumped up on a hickory stump and said,
“Boy let me tell you what:
I guess you didn´t know it, but I’m a fiddle player too,
And if you’d care to take a dare,
I’ll make a bet with you
Now you play a pretty good fiddle,
Boy, but give the Devil his due
I bet a fiddle of gold against your soul
‘Cause I think I’m better than you”
The boy said, “My name’s Johnny and it might be a sin,
But I’ll take your bet, you’re gonna regret,
‘Cause I’m the best there’s ever been”
The devil loses and Johnny walks away with the golden fiddle saying. “Just come on back if you ever want to try again. I done told you once you son of a bitch I’m the best there as ever been.”
It is the faith that “the devil”, which, of course, is all forms of fear, has no place in your world. It is the belief that you have what it takes to win. Each time you defeat your fears you get you get the prize – the gold.
Faith is knowing that your own personal power is so profound you can’t lose. No matter what. You simply can’t lose. As my favorite role model for faith, Martin Luther King, Jr., said, “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”
This week vet your fears. Ask yourself how different your life would be if everything was always working out for you. Then start living that way because it is.
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