The Power of Commitment

Listen to me! You can pray for anything, and if you believe, you will have it. - Mark 11:24

There are two types of martial artists: those who are into the forms and breaking boards, and those who fight. Very few people do both. These different styles are for different purposes, requiring completely different training methods. However, they do have this in common: something called follow-through. A friend told me that when he breaks, he tries to mentally see his hand following a straight white line through the boards. He tries to follow that line and the boards just happen to be in the way. When he succeeds in perfectly visualizing this, he also succeeds in breaking the boards. Because he doesn’t “see” the boards, but only sees the line, he proceeds without fear. He proceeds fully committed.

The same thing helps in the fighting arts. If you hesitate during the attempt of a throw, if you are timid in your punch, the lack of committal causes you to lack momentum. Your hand will hurt when you make contact because there is not enough momentum. Your opponent will not go down because all your weight is not into the throw. Fighters are not to punch TO but THROUGH their target.

In the Christian life, I have too often been guilty of timid prayers. I ask God for something but my faith lacks that extra little “umph” that comes from faith. I pray for rain, but I don’t carry an umbrella. I ask God for forgiveness, but don’t rejoice in the answer. I ask God to save my friends or family, but I fail to witness. We are talking about so much more than mere positive thinking. If that were the case, God would be no more complex than a vast bubble gum machine. Put in sufficient currency (in this case positive thinking) and out comes what you wish for. Let’s return for a moment to the board breaking analogy. Let’s say that I succeed in fully visualizing the line through the board, but fail to drive my punch through…will the board break? No, of course not. Visualization is insufficient without follow-through. Similarly, faith without action is useless. That’s what James says in James 1:6-8, 2:14, 17 “Ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways…What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead being by itself.”

So, what is the relationship between Mark 11: 24 and James and martial artists? If you truly believe, you will act upon that belief. If you are not acting, you are not believing, and you will not receive.