The Backward Leap

At the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, Dick Fosbury did something no one had ever seen. While every other high jumper attacked the bar face-first — able to see exactly where they were going — Fosbury turned his back to the bar and leapt blind.

The crowd thought he was crazy. Commentators were baffled. His own coaches had spent years trying to talk him out of it. But Fosbury had discovered something remarkable: when you arch your back and fall away from what you can see, you actually clear greater heights than when you muscle your way over face-first.

He won the gold medal that day and changed the sport forever. Today, every elite high jumper in the world uses the Fosbury Flop.

Faith works the same way. Our instinct is to face every obstacle head-on, relying on what we can see, calculating every angle. But Hebrews 11:1 tells us faith is "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Sometimes the Almighty asks us to turn around, arch backward into the unknown, and trust that He has prepared a landing beneath us.

The world will call it foolish. Your own logic might resist it. But the God who catches sparrows mid-flight will not let you fall beyond His reach. The heights you cannot clear face-first, you may just clear by falling backward into grace.