The Unpredictable

I was talking to a young man who was having a rough day.  He was one of our youth competitors—a talented young grappler with excellent skills who worked incredibly hard at his Jiu-jitsu.  But today had been a rough one.  He had lost all his matches.

He had recently promoted in belt rank and this was his first tournament at the new level.  It had not gone well for him.  As someone who had cleaned up his previous brackets with impressive wins, he’d had an expectation that he would do the same again.  But that wasn’t the case.  He fought hard, but his best just hadn’t been good enough.

He was frustrated and tearful, both things that I understand, because I, too, hate losing.  I was trying to console him as best I could, and he was doing his best to be receptive.  I knew it was hard.

“Listen,” I said, “we could have let you stay at your old rank.  You would have competed against all the kids you beat last time you did this.  You could have entered a tournament that you knew you were going to win.  But that has no value.  It doesn’t mean anything if you already know when you’re going to win.”

He was still sad, but he understood.  He’s fantastic student like that.

It wasn’t too long ago when I was on one of my internal mind-journeys where I talk with and wrestle with God.  I was trying to make some sense of things and found myself desperate for some kind of clarity. I just wanted God to tell when things were going to end and when the other things were going to begin.  I wanted Him to let me know what the checklist looked like—what the prerequisites for being allowed to leave a seeming desert season of my life might look like.  I wanted some predictability.   It was then that the memory of this conversation suddenly popped into my head. 

In some quiet way, something said to me, “you should listen better to your own advice.  It doesn’t mean anything if you already know when you’re going to win.”

It reminded me of what was probably the best fight I ever fought in my career.

It came to me in a strange set of circumstances.  The matchmaker for that show had reached out to my manager several weeks before about me fighting a talented up-and-comer.  I knew him a little bit and I knew he was good—we had crossed paths just a couple of times.  My manager spoke with my coaches and my coaches spoke with me.  We agreed to take the fight.  But, before the contracts could be signed, the promoter decided to match him with a different opponent.

The promoter had known me years before and remembered me as a very different fighter.  I had been an exceedingly amateur fighter, and that was the impression he still maintained of my skills.  He wanted to give this rising star a more competitive fight that had a better chance of entertaining the crowd.  I was disappointed but I got it.  He had bills to pay.

That fight fell by the way and out of my memory until about noon the day before the show was scheduled.  I was at work (because I definitely didn’t make enough money as a fighter to pay all my bills) when I received a surprising phone call from my manager.

“It’s last minute,” he told me, “But they want you to fight, and they’re willing to pay for it.”

I was a little incredulous.  “You mean they want me to fight tomorrow?  In the fight they already passed me over for?”

“That’s the one,” he said.  “The guy they replaced you with injured himself and waited until the last second to tell anybody.”

I was in good enough shape at that time.  Even though I hadn’t been scheduled to fight I was still training hard.  I didn’t have anything on the horizon, but my physical conditioning was on point.

I quickly checked in with my supervisor to see if I would be allowed to leave work early.  She didn’t have a problem with it, so I called my coaches.  It took them mere seconds to accept the proposal.  They were more excited by the idea than I was.

I drove straight to the nearest sauna that I could access and cut the few pounds I needed to get to weight.  It wasn’t a hard cut and it wasn’t an easy one.  It was pretty much standard.  From there I cruised home to grab some gear, then started toward the venue.

On a normal day, the drive to the event would have taken about 90 minutes, but there had been some sort of traffic incident.  The drive took an hour longer than it should have.  I started to get phone calls from matchmakers and promoters, but I assured them I was on the way.  They were a little flustered, but they also recognized that last-minute arrangements come with inconveniences. 

I made it to the event center a little bit after dark and just before they had finished weighing in the undercard fighters.  I was scheduled to fight in the main event, but I was the last to weigh in.  I had to get my medical checks and sign contracts after my weight had been established—which is backward—but it all worked out in the end.  They provided me with a hotel room and voucher for the buffet.  I visited the buffet but didn’t do much damage.  I seldom ate heavily the night before a fight.  I watched a little TV in my room then got a good night’s sleep. 

I woke up feeling relaxed and refreshed.  All the chaos and movement from the day before had never given me a chance to be anxious.  I usually signed contracts to fight several weeks from the night of the fight.  It left all kinds of time to spend in my brain worrying and wondering.  I had some coffee and a small breakfast in a nearby café.  I think I even wrote one of my blog posts that morning to pass the time.  My blood-pressure wasn’t elevated, my heart rate was even, and my mind was cool.

My coaches met me in the early afternoon, having driven several hours to join me.  They each brought a few others with them—significant others, assistant coaches, teammates.  Despite the short notice, I had a team there to support me.  I was beyond honored.

The day didn’t speed by and it didn’t crawl by.  It was just a day, almost like any other—except that I would be fighting in a cage in a few hours.  I talked with my coaches and friends about silly things and remained at ease with my team.  We showed at the venue at the required time, attended the rules meeting, and found our place in the warmup area.

As the scheduled main event on a packed card, I had some way to go before my time came.  There was a lot of activity—the other fighters, media personnel, a celebrity fighter who had been paid to show.  I wandered around and chatted with a few folks then headed back to the warm-up area.  My coach knew it was going to be a while before I fought.  He told me to lie down for a bit, so I did.  He put a towel over my eyes and I dozed off.

I woke when the fights actually started—it got pretty loud in that casino.  My coaches decided we would start getting ready at the first scheduled intermission.  When that time came, I had my hands wrapped and started warming up.  By the second intermission I was ready to go.  There were two more fights, then it was time for me to walk to the cage.

I hadn’t been asked to pick walk-out music since things had happened so quickly, so I don’t even remember what was playing.  I just walked down to the cage and waited for my opponent.  There’s a picture out there somewhere of me just leaning on the cage and waiting.  I look relaxed and am smiling while I joke with my coaches.

When the fight started, I immediately knew that he didn’t come to give me an easy victory.  He came out with sharp boxing combinations, throwing tight and straight.  I felt relaxed and felt like I was seeing everything he had to offer.  I slipped his punches and started responding with my own.  He caught me with a decent hook, but I caught him first and I caught him last.  I could see that it was a bad trade for him by the startled look on his face.  He stepped back and I threw a nasty leg-kick, just like my striking coach had been drilling.  It was beautiful and pure destructive contact.  I knew it had been effective because he immediately clinched before I could follow up.

We proceeded through all phases of MMA fighting—striking, clinch, ground.  He was dangerous and putting me in danger at every turn.  He hunted submissions, sought openings to strike, and fought for dominant positions.  But I was doing the same, and I was doing it better.  I could feel how strong he was and his skillset was obvious.  I fought out of armbars, defended hard body-blows, and escaped funky wrestling chains.  When the first round ended, I could tell that he was exhausted.  We had been moving at a punishing pace.  He wandered to his corner with his posture slumped.

I walked to my corner feeling like I had just finished a couple of light-sparring rounds.  I didn’t even sit down for my minute break.  I hadn’t had a formal training camp for this event, so my body hadn’t taken the usual damage that came from those weeks of training. 

The advice from my coaches was minimal—just do more of what you just did.  And I did.  I walked out to the center of the cage where I met him for the second round.  He had switched leads to hide the leg I had kicked.  His punches were a little slower.  He was still a threat to me, so I made a conscious effort to stay sharp with my defensive posture. 

That round I was just a little bit faster.  I won’t say I was stronger—he was physically much stronger than I—but I was definitely more effective.  I started to grind.  I could feel his energy flagging.  There was a moment—the sort of moment that most experienced fighters recognize—when I felt his spirit break.  He wilted.  With just a few seconds left in the second round, I finished him with a triangle choke.

I don’t tend to celebrate victories in any animated fashion; it’s just not my style.  But that night, after having dinner with my team, I couldn’t sleep.  Adrenaline coursed through my veins.  I was ecstatic at that win.  I had proven so much that day.

 I had proven that I could beat a top tier fighter. 

I had proven to a misinformed promoter that I wasn’t the same fighter I used to be. 

I had proven to my coaches that their investment in me had born fruit. 

I had proven to other fighters that I was a legitimate threat.

I had proven all of this amid a cacophony of uncertainty.  Perhaps I had proven all of it because of the uncertainty.

God doesn’t always let me in on the plan.  He doesn’t provide a comfortable routine.  As a matter of fact, He seems really determined to disrupt my routines and comfort.  He doesn’t tend to let me in on the design, though, and sometimes—most of the time—I think I would really like to know what’s going to happen.

I understand the toughest fight—the most important one—has already been won.  There is victory there and my eternity is secured.  That’s the one that matters most.  It’s actually the only one that matters.

He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son He loves. (Colossians 1:13) 

It’s hard for me to focus on eternity.  I’m not there yet.  I’m still making my way through this life that God granted me, and this life is fraught with challenges.  Sometimes I walk myself into a hardship—the result of my own decisions and choices—and I find myself begging for God to rescue me from consequences.  I might find myself suffering at the hands of another, a victim of their decisions and choices.  Frequently, hardship is hardship and can’t be blamed on anyone, even though I have a propensity for finding a way to blame myself.  We live in a fallen world and our fallen world marshals its forces against me from time to time.

Everything I see is rooted in the here and now.  I don’t have the benefit of God’s vision.  I can’t see what the future holds and I can’t see the plan that God is machinating.  My viewpoint is thin and what I see is seen only in obscurity.  I don’t get to see the whole picture yet.  It forces me to trust the process.

For now we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, as I am fully known.  (1 Corinthians 13:12) 

If I knew how, or when, these desert seasons might end, I don’t think they would have nearly as much value to them.  In all honesty, I don’t necessarily recognize the value of challenging times when I find myself in the middle of them.  When I find myself mired in the moment it’s pretty much all I can focus on—again, I can’t help but be focused on the moment because it is the most prevalent thing in my vision. 

I think I want things to be predictable.  I think I want to know what happens next.  I think I want to have a clue, at least, as to when this thing (whatever it might be) is going to end or turn a corner.  A big part of me thinks that it likes a routine and craves to know what’s going to happen next.

But that’s not where I thrive.

Good things seldom happen to me in predictable moments.  The best things seem to happen in the middle of the unexpected.  I wonder, at times, if that’s why God holds so many things in mystery, out of my sight and ability to know.  He knows that my most valuable moments happen when I can’t predict them.

I know, LORD, that a man's way of life is not his own; no one who walks determines his own steps. (Jeremiah 10:23) 

I know that the unpredictable moments are the best moments for me.  I learn so much from them.  If I wanted to embrace the cliché, I would say that I learn best out of my comfort zone.  I’m not much for cliches, but the clichés sometimes fit.  I’m at my best when I don’t know what the ending looks like.  It just doesn’t always feel like my best.  In a weird sort of way, I think that’s what makes it my best—if that makes any sense.

Predictability would ruin the story.  There would be no suspense.  The victory would be no victory if I had the script.  A script would make it easy, and I don’t thrive when things are easy.  That’s not how God built me.  He built me to know I can trust His plan, even when it’s difficult—especially when it’s difficult.  He’s got something on the horizon for me that I can’t see.

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways." This is the LORD's declaration.  "For as heaven is higher than earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9) 

It’s frustrating sometimes—most of the time—when I’m in the middle of these desert seasons.  I want to know when it’s going to end.  I want a checklist that tells me all the things I need to do to end the discomfort.  I want God to tell me what’s expected of me so that I can meet the standard and the hard times can end.  Then I think of all the things I would miss if I could predict the end of the story.

Just the other day I wandered in for open mat.  It was a pretty standard day of training, but for some  reason attendance was really light.  I looked around and there were only a few of us on the mats.  One of the few others was a grappler I had only rolled with a couple of times.  He was strong—with biceps the size of my thighs—and he was athletic.  He was also young.  In short, he was all the things I was not.

We started off light, because we were both getting a little warmed up.  But, within just a few minutes, we were working at a high rate of output.  Sure, it was a friendly roll, but it felt downright unfriendly.  We were getting to work with intention.  He was tough, and he really wanted to finish me—most people do.

Because of the way things worked out we had never started a timer.   We just got to work…and we kept working.  We sparred hard, exchanging submission attempts and submission defenses.  We just kept going and going…and going.  There were a few natural breaks—places we could have separated and ended the session.  But we didn’t.  It might have been my ego or it might have been my ethos.  I refused to stop.  By the time we were done nearly an hour had passed.  We had been trying to murder each other for about 50 minutes.

I’d had no idea when that session was going to end—in fact, it never did.  The class ended first and we were forced to stop.  But in that hour of unpredictability—that hour of not knowing when the round was going to be over—I had proven to myself that I could still hang with the young guys.  I had demonstrated that my technique was solid enough to compensate for someone much stronger than me.  My cardio had proven to be more than enough (I won’t pretend it didn’t hurt later).

I would have never known these things about me if there had been a timer on the round.  I might have found myself playing to survive until I heard the bell.  I hadn’t known when the session was going to end and I had spent the entire spar trying to end it, myself.  He had not been a willing participant in my attempts, and that had forced me to be the best version of myself that I could access.

I don’t necessarily know what I’m learning through some of these desert seasons.  I may never know.  Maybe God will give me some occasional glimpses into the fruits His process has wrought.  But I don’t think He’s going to tell me when it ends, or how it ends.  Not right now.  He’s going to use these moments to mold me into something different.  He’ll use them to transform me into something better.  The unpredictability is going to force me to lean into Hin.  No story is better if you know how it ends.

We all, with unveiled faces, are looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord and are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory; this is from the Lord who is the Spirit. (2 Corinthians 3:18) 

I’m not going to pretend like this is an easy thing.  I’m not good at trusting God with the unpredictable.  I’m still trying to process it with myself.  I wish I could make myself understand.

I still want the predictability.  I want to know how and when these uncomfortable things are going to end.  I want God to let me in on His secret.  I want to know how long I need to hold out.  I want God to tell me when to stop, or when to start, or when to change positions.  But God wants me to trust his process.  I’ll refuse to trust if I already know the outcome. 

Predictability leaves me as the same me I was before the trial began.  I don’t want that.  I want to be a better and different me than I was.

God has a plan.  It’s not my plan. It’s His plan.

I know, LORD, that a man's way of life is not his own; no one who walks determines his own steps. (Jeremiah 10:23) 

It’s going to be difficult.  It’s going to be difficult a lot, because I’m a difficult student and I’m hard to teach.  But God knows how I learn, and He’s going to teach me in the ways I learn best.  He’s going to teach me in the middle of the unpredictability. 

And I’m going to learn.  I’m going to learn more than I think is possible.

No, in all these things we are more than victorious through Him who loved us. (Romans 8:37)