Slipping Away

Ever feel like you were just slipping away, that life was absolutely crowding you to the edge and you were loosing your footing?  Perhaps, even now, you are feeling overwhelmed with the pressures, the challenges or the negative forces in your world that you don't know how you will hang on.  You may be wishing that you were stronger, that you had it more together, that you could find the strength to stand up against the storm that is rising.

King David did - a man who out of all of Israel was hand-picked by God to be the leader of Israel, a man who fought a lion, a bear and a giant - and won!  King David, described by the Lord as "a man after my own heart" (Acts 13:22), came to a place where he felt that he could not hold on.  But, he did not look for personal inner strength, he did not seek to conjure up the ability to overcome somehow, instead, he looked deeper, he looked for the strength of the Lord:

"Who will rise up for me against the wicked? Who will take a stand for me against evildoers? Unless the Lord had given me help, I would soon have dwelt in the silence of death. When I said, “My foot is slipping, ” your unfailing love, Lord, supported me. When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought me joy" (Ps 94:16-19).

Notice he did not ask, "How can I keep from slipping away?"  Instead, he poses the question, "Who? Who will will rise up for me?"  And the answer is "the Lord!"  The Lord will rise, the Lord will stand, the Lord will support me when anxiety is great - when I'm slipping away, it is God, not me, that steadies my feet.

Listen to what Jesus says to the one heavily burdened by life: "...take my yoke upon you and you will find rest for your soul" (Mt 11:29).  He does not say that he will take away your burden or that he will empower you to overcome it, he says that he will help you pull it - that is purpose of a double yoke, for one ox to pull with another when the burden is too great for the one, when, try as he might, he cannot gain enough traction or call up enough strength to make it on his own.

Our Lord Jesus wants to steady our feet, to keep us from slipping away, when the burden of life is pressing us toward the edge, when we just can't find our footing.  The question is only, "Will we accept his offer of grace or try to manage on our own?"  Jus' Ask'n.