Never Beyond: What Shape Is Your Bite?

This post is part of the series, “Never Beyond: A POTSC Series”  For more information on the series, please click on this link.

As I contemplated the nature of sharks (while watching shark week reruns with my boys), I realized that often sharks reputations keep them at arm’s length from most people.  Few people will swim with the sharks so to speak.

Shark bites tend to change your life forever.  They maim in such a way that life becomes irreparable altered.  You lose a part of you that was integral to your personality and belief system.

The second chance takes flight when you put the bite and what it took out of you behind you.  You start a new adventure that leads you down a path of acceptance and forgiveness.  Even though the shark bite hurt, the life it created doesn’t keep you from what God created and maybe even intended.

Check out these stories from two ladies who experienced bites in their lives.

Bethany Hamilton – Surfer who lost an arm to an actual shark.  A new movie chronicles the pain and growth she experienced.   Her life might have taken a different turn if not for that fateful night. 

Anne Bercht – Her husband announced that he had an affair and decided to leave her.  Anne fought through a healing process that made this moment the best moment that could have happen to her.  This bite has redefined her life in ways that she could never have imagined. 

Check a video interview with her here:

What does this mean for the shark?  Often times sharks don’t stick around after the first attack.  They take off with their spoils and enjoy them alone.

However…

The shark gets stuck….  The shark cannot just swim away….

Brian Bercht – He couldn’t just leave his family and marry another women.  Stuck, God moved in his life and removed the shark skin attached.  He and Anne attacked the problems in their marriage.  This fight allowed them to revive and repair a marriage that had died. 

Check out his interview here:

Moments of God’s grace layers the wound like a bandage… Healing occurs and the shark suit gets removed.  Radical Grace shapes the shark’s bite into a stone to step on to get where God has you going.  May not be where you planned but that doesn’t seem to matter.

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