Slip sliding away

When I said, “My foot is slipping!” Your unfailing love, O Eternal One, held me up. When anxiety overtakes me and worries are many, Your comfort lightens my soul.  (Psalm 94:18-19 VOICE)

    Martin Luther King said, "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."  We have a moment of success and feel like we are standing on the top of the world - as though nothing could "undo" the feeling we are riding high on for that moment in time.  We also all know just how fleeting "riding" on success can be - for nothing soars forever - all things must return to ground level!  Comfort and convenience can be the enemies of challenge and controversy as much as the other way around.  We don't want to move when we are comfortable, much less find ourselves in a position in which we might actually feel the footing going out from underneath ourselves!  It is the moments of near "slippage" that we come to know how sure our footing in life really is, though.

    When challenge and controversy come your way - where do you stand?  What motivates you to continue in the midst of doubt and frustration?  Who is it you look to for advice, direction, and solutions to the thing standing clearly in your path?  Much of what we "go through" in life is really that - something we will get to the other side of eventually - but to get through, one must move!  We all know worries can be the enemy of movement - we might just tend to think of worrying as "running in place".  We want an escape, so we run, but we just run in place, making a rut in the place we are standing.  Worrying "wears down" the space because we tend to spend too much time allowing it to "rub us raw"!  A challenge is what we enter into whenever the authority we are submitted to and live under is challenged.  A controversy is that moment in time when we recognize we are in direct opposition to whatever it is we are facing - either because we are standing on the right side of the argument, or the wrong side of it.

    We can either embrace God harder and closer as we face the challenge and deal with the controversy, or we can choose to weather it on our own.  Truly, we might just find the things which prove to be the best challenges and hardest controversies manage to sort themselves out, bringing clarity and purpose into our lives just because of how close they brought us to realizing we don't walk them alone!  Look again at what our psalmist wants us to see in this passage - it isn't that we face the challenge, or deal with the controversy - it is that we admit we are not able to stand alone - our foot is slipping.  Every now and again, while I am on a daily walk with my BFF, she reminds me to not fall.  You see, she was there the day I almost face-planted on the hard gravel outside our building.  She saw me moving so quickly toward the ground nothing could stop my descent.  She and I still laugh when we think about me hitting those rocks with the full weight of my body and then bouncing up quickly so no one would see me!  But something she does that even lightens my spirit more than bringing me to see the levity of that moment is when she sees me slipping in my spiritual life, the way I am dealing with an issue, or even when I am just grumbling through life - the moment she helps me realize my footing isn't all that great.  

    You see, we don't always understand where our feet are planted until we need to reach out for something to catch onto when we are about to slip!  It is at the point of realizing our footing is giving way that we reach out.  Isn't it important to know when we need a stronghold to strengthen our stand that stronghold is actually the arms of Jesus?  Just askin!

Leaking Dams

Ever start something you wish you didn't have to finish?  I have - lots of times.  The truth is, we all do.  If you don't believe me think about the last time you opened your mouth, allowing words to escape which would have been better off not said at all!  What happened with just that tiny escape of words?  It opened up the floodgates, didn't it?  Yep, our words have a way of creating more than just a little "flux" in our lives!  

The start of a quarrel is like a leak in a dam, so stop it before it bursts. (Proverbs 17:14 MSG)

Solomon was known as the wisest man in his time.  I daresay, even with all the technological advances of this day and age, he probably still would bear that title today.  How do you suppose he "learned" all this stuff?  Do you think he was "born smart"?  If you think that, you are probably a little deluded, because if you study his life, you will see he was pretty much learning this stuff as he went!  It is exactly how most of us really gain wisdom.  Sure, we ask for it, but we learn it in the trenches.

This little passage really speaks volumes - a quarrel doesn't begin by the volume of words we speak - it begins with the words we allow to be spoken!  You have probably heard me say we need to think all we say, but not say all we think.  I guess this should go without saying, but trust me, we all need to hear this!  We often speak without thinking about the impact of our words.  Whenever we do, the small "fissure" we make with those words becomes the very thing which will weaken the "dam" holding back lots more!

If you look up quarrel in the dictionary, you find words like "dispute", "disagreement", and even "hostility".  The most telling part about the definition is what happens to the relationship - there is a break!  The break may be temporary, but it could be life-long.  The root of the word is to complain.  I wonder how many times we air our complaints without giving any thought to the possible "fissures" those very complaints are making in the relationship?  Quarreling may refer to a "slight" shared because of words which are spoken, but enough "slights" and you pretty much weaken the relationship's integrity.

The words of Solomon - stop it before it bursts!  In the Amplified Bible, this verse speaks of stopping contention before it becomes a quarrel.  I think this is probably a little closer to the original language - because contention is the controversy we establish with our words - quarreling is the result of enough contention!  So, contention is like the small leak - quarreling is the dam bursting.  The implication is to watch what it is we set our minds and attitude toward - for what we take pleasure into entering into debate over may actually be our undoing!

To go back to my earlier point, Solomon didn't learn this as he slept.  He learned it because his family was filled with all kinds of strife, contention, and rivalry!  His brother wanted the throne - his mother wanted Solomon to have it.  The contention which ensued made for a lot of rocky years for Solomon.  He came from a pretty dysfunctional home.  Dad committed adultery, littlest brother died shortly after childbirth, brothers fought against brothers, lust became a problem in his own life, and the list goes on.  He learned this stuff in the trenches!  If we think we will be any different, think again!

When we speak words which bring strife into the relationship, perhaps we'd do well to consider the value of the words we speak.  We may want to express our "feelings", but we all know how untrustworthy our own "feelings" can be.  They will lead us down paths we'd rather not travel almost every time we rely upon them!  So, why do we allow our "feelings" to influence the words we speak?  Maybe we would do well to ask God to "ride shotgun" over our feelings so we don't use them as the basis of the words we speak!  Just sayin!