Tightrope walking requires training and focus. Pastor’s wife Melissa Wiita made an instant connection with women attending the 2015 GARBC Conference workshop “Walking Life’s Tightrope: Maintaining Balance.” Family, church, home, and job responsibilities are common life stressors that can cause believers to lose balance.
In preparing for the workshop, Wiita discovered a book on Blondin, a famous daredevil tightrope walker who performed various stunts while walking across the Niagara Falls in the mid-19th century. Intentional preparation and deliberate planning enabled Blondin to successfully complete multiple death-defying trips across the Niagara.
In drawing analogies to Blondin’s tightrope walking, Wiita challenged the women to set their focus on Christ and to train their minds to view all of life as ministry. Citing the example of Priscilla and Aquilla’s willingness to relocate and reestablish their lives for the sake of the gospel in Acts 18, Wiita prompted workshop attendees to examine the use of their homes, secular vocations, and knowledge to further the work of the ministry. She prompted the women to be open to new opportunities to minister to others.
As an ending challenge, attendees received tightrope-walking questions to consider: In what manner are you walking? Who are you walking toward? Who or what is trying to knock you off the rope?
