In trouble again?

Defeat may serve as well as victory to shake the soul and let the glory out. (Edwin Markham)

Is anyone crying for help? God is listening, ready to rescue you. If your heart is broken, you’ll find God right there; if you’re kicked in the gut, he’ll help you catch your breath. Disciples so often get into trouble; still, God is there every time. (Psalm 34:17-19)

Markham also challenged us with the words: "We have committed the Golden Rule to memory, let us now commit it to life." There are far more times when we 'know the rule' but choose to live contrary to the rule. Those are the moments when God stands at the ready to rescue us from the folly of our own devices. Anyone who has ever been 'rescued' in this life can share just how much their need pressed upon them and how great it was to see that rescuer arriving just in the nick of time. We may not fully appreciate how much we need rescuing today, kind of poking along in life, thinking we are doing 'pretty good' with life choices, and then comes along this thing we call the 'big temptation' or 'tumultuous trial'. Just like that, we desire a rescue! We cry for help. We look, wait, call again, wait some more, all the while hoping that our rescuer heard our call. The good news is that even when we get ourselves in the place where we need a 'rescue', the rescuer always comes! God is listening, even when we don't do such a good job of making the right choices. God is ready, even before we know we have need of the rescue!

Defeat may seem immanent; rescue may seem like it won't happen but wait. That time between when we recognize we are pressed up against a wall, unable to escape on our own, drifting further and further from the 'rule' and closer and closer to our own folly may be a little bit, but God never stops listening for our cry for help. He knows there will come that moment when we feel like we cannot escape but he isn't about to ignore our need. He is ready to rescue. Sometimes rescue comes in the form of complete delivery. At others, it requires us to become 'disentangled' from whatever has us so easily 'tangled' into a mess of wrong choices and actions. Whatever 'form' the rescue takes, it is God's plan to bring relief and salvage what is able to be salvaged from the experience. We may want to leave everything behind, not thinking there is anything good that could come from the mess we were in, but God knows what is able to be used to help us avoid the same entrapment the next time. Just sayin!