I need a little 'filler' here God

I have been around those recovering from alcohol or drug addiction and heard them say things like, "When I hit rock bottom..." or "My rock bottom came when..."  Their meaning was that life had to reach a certain 'low' in order for them to realize just how far they had fallen into the hold of their addiction. They are indicating that 'bottom' isn't the same for everyone - theirs was different than yours or mine. There is a point for each of us, though, when we finally realize we have 'hit bottom' in some area of our life and that 'bottom' feeling leaves us desirous of getting help to finally be free of the pit we have dug for ourselves. It may not be addiction to a substance, but we all have a 'bottom' in terms of something we need to say a final "no" to in our lives. It may be some secret addiction like pornography, or something very 'out there' like the use of food to deal with some sense of frustration or disappointment in our lives. Regardless of what 'bottom' we have hit, the same assurance is there for all of us - God is there in the bottom just as he was before we even took up the shovel to start digging that pit! Some 'pits' are deeper than others. Some may resemble a deep well, while others are kind of like a shallow grave. Either way - the way out is the same!

So let God work his will in you. Yell a loud no to the Devil and watch him scamper. Say a quiet yes to God and he’ll be there in no time. Quit dabbling in sin. Purify your inner life. Quit playing the field. Hit bottom, and cry your eyes out. The fun and games are over. Get serious, really serious. Get down on your knees before the Master; it’s the only way you’ll get on your feet. James 4:10 MSG

The way out is to say a firm "no" to the influence and a quiet "yes" to God. Why a loud no to the influence? Why a quiet yes to God? Seems like we'd yell out to God, doesn't it? Like we'd plead for mercy, crying aloud about our helplessness over the thing that so easily trips us up - right? What we are being told here is that it isn't the 'loudness' of our voice as much as the determination of our hearts. A determined heart acknowledges there has been wrong choices leading to a whole lot of wrong actions - and admits there is little one can do to stop those actions in their own power. God isn't impressed with the loudness of our pleas as much as he is moved by the conviction in our hearts and submission in our spirit.

He is looking for us to say a firm "I don't want this anymore" to the sin we have been pursuing. That is the beginning of the deliverance - the grave or pit can no longer be our habitation because we are about to be taken from the place of rock bottom. Do you know how pits get dealt with? There isn't a whole lot of safety in just covering over them. If we want to be sure we don't fall into that pit again, we fill it in! We do more than put a barrier between us and the depth of the pit - we allow the pit to be filled with something that keeps it from becoming a place we can inhabit or be tripped up in again. Too many times, I think we just want a 'lid' put over the pit - reminding it is there - but not really dealing with the depth of the issue. Whenever we don't deal with the depth of the pit, we are apt to find ourselves exploring it again!

Conviction is the beginning of repentance. Repentance is the beginning of starting afresh. But...the break with the past 'pit' must be made 'stone by stone', level by level. God will take great care to help us fill those spaces which have been steps into the depths of that pit by 'filling' them with his presence, peace, strength, and power. His Word becomes powerful 'back-fill' for those pits - like a stone upon a stone, one promise builds upon another until we see there is no way we are ever going to stumble back into the depths of that compromise again. The 'bottom' is no longer there because it has been filled up. God wants us to be safe, so he does more than provide 'covers' for our sin - he provides all the 'filler' we need to be sure those pits are no longer going to be our places of captivity. Just sayin!

No easy way out of that pit?

Have you ever noticed how quickly you can dig a pit and easily fall into it - then how slowly and difficultly you find your way out of it again? The pit wasn't hard to dig. It might have started by a little rut we created by walking in the same place for just a little too long - longer than we might have wanted to and without paying much attention to the fact that forward progress just wasn't being made. Then in a matter of time, that small rut began to take on the form of a deeper rut which "morphed" into some pit of astronomical proportion! There you were, smack-dab in the midst of a pit, surrounded by the four walls you actually dug yourself - maybe without even noticing!

I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry.  He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire.  He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see what he has done and be amazed. They will put their trust in the Lord. (Psalm 40:1-3 NLT)

A pit starts as a small depression, but because of the continued "traveling" over the same place of the small depression, the size of the depression increases. Ever wonder why someone coined the phrase of being in the pits when they feel a little depressed? Maybe that explains it! Some pits are of our own digging - outright deliberate actions taken by us to start the work of digging the pit. Other pits are because we didn't really notice we were getting deeper and deeper into something - it caught us unaware. Still others come because someone else digs them, either as a means of capturing us or because they intended our doom!

If we examine the first type - those we dig because of some deliberate action on our part - we might just see the pit was dug because we desired to hide from someone or something. In the military, they taught us to dig pits in order to get shelter from enemy fire - to hide from the attack all around us. These fox-holes, as they were named, were not only protection, they were successful hiding places. We could "mask" our presence and honker down for the duration of the fight. Many a military man or woman will tell us just how frequently "hiding" in these holes didn't actually preserve life, for the same hole they dug for protection became the hole where they died. We might plan one thing, but realize quite a different thing!

The second type of pit is actually the pit that occurs when we don't take notice of our actions. The continually ruminating over some issue or returning to some sinful pattern repeatedly actually creates an indentation of sorts in our spiritual, mental, or physical life. That indentation becomes more and more pronounced the more we ruminate over the issue or return to the patterned behavior time and time again. One day we realize the indentation is now a huge pit of what some label as despair or depravity. There is a sense of hopelessness that prevails because we don't know how we got there and we don't know a way out. In truth, when we examine the things we have been thinking on (meditating on) in our minds, we begin to see the way the walls of this pit were dug! 

The last type of pit is really not of our doing - but it is definitely meant for our undoing. Others dig this pit - it is meant as an outright trap to ensnare us and hold us captive. In times gone by, a hunter might dig a pit to catch some large animal just out for a walk in the forest. The pit was big enough to capture the animal, but also big enough to keep it there! The one who digs a pit for us isn't doing so to just put an obstacle in our path - it is intended to keep us there until we are so weak and overcome by the fight to be free that we just give up fighting any longer! 

Either way, the pits are definitely not our friends! Any pit can become the place of our "captivity". What we do in the midst of the pit makes all the difference - for in looking up, crying out, and being expectant for deliverance, we posture ourselves for the escape we so desperately need. The way out of the pit isn't because we make the ladder - it is because he lifts us out! It is his doing - our posture in the pit is that of humble submission to his hand and his delivering strength. Just sayin!

You riding a bicycle or tricycle?

Ruined lives surround us no matter where we live.  People start out well, but somehow through a series of misadventures and wrong turns, their lives end up in a state of shambles, almost like falling down shacks.  Along the way, they may have heard advice to not take a certain path, or to turn away from what they were pursuing with such earnest.  In ignoring the warnings, they compounded their misfortune and increased their speed of decline.  Now, at the bottom of the pit, they live with nothing more than regrets and the constant wondering of the "what if".  The worrisome part of their decline into the pit is the possibility of them having blamed God for the decline - for putting them in the pit.  In reality, it was their failure to heed warnings, to turn away from their self-directed pursuits.  Why is it we blame God when things end in ruins?  He isn't a God of "ruin", but of "hope", "possibilities", and even "impossibilities".  

People ruin their lives by their own stupidity, so why does God always get blamed?  (Proverbs 19:3 MSG)

Scripture is quite plain, no matter which interpretation or version you consult - people ruin their lives by their own decisions, actions, and self-directed paths. On the other hand, people do not really "improve" their lives - at best, we can do a little self-help regimen which might create a different set of circumstances for ourselves for a while, but true life change only is accomplished by the indwelling of God's Spirit in our lives.  Try as we might, we cannot change ourselves.  Scripture calls following our own path "foolishness" or "folly".  It ends in disaster, defeat, and decline - in other words, the bottom of the pit!  What seems good at the moment results in a "pay-out" much worse than we counted on.

Self-directed lives have a natural "flaw" - they are directed by emotion and reason (two quite unreliable sources of direction for our lives).  Yesterday, we spoke about the importance of man's three parts - body, soul, and spirit.  As we explored those three aspects of our being, we discovered man needs the spirit to bring balance to the things "sensed" in the body and "experienced" in the emotions, rational intelligence, etc.  Relying upon one or the other exclusively (body or soul) is definitely leaving us at risk.  If man relies upon how he interprets life simply by what he "senses" with his body - sight, smell, touch, hearing, etc. - he will lack the help of the intellect and emotion to "interpret" what he is sensing.  On the other hand, if he relies solely upon emotions to give him insight into right choices, he may miss the importance of how emotions are affected by our senses.  Body and soul walk side-by-side - but they still need a "third wheel" to give them balance much in the same way we need a third wheel on a tricycle!

A bicycle is like relying upon the body and soul - we can go places, but we may lack the stability of balance.  Adding the third wheel to the bicycle makes it a tricycle. If you learned to ride one of these, you know you didn't have to work hard to keep yourself upright - the third wheel assisted us in balancing without much effort on our part.  In the same manner, the spirit is the place of balance in our lives - the place of connection with God.  I realize this is an over-simplified illustration, but when we begin to recognize how the Spirit of God influences our spirit and brings us to a place of "reliable balance" in our decisions, we become less reliant upon our own abilities to remain upright and moving forward (like we have to when riding a two-wheel bicycle).  The "third wheel" is not added to the back, but to the front.  Think of the body and soul as being those two back wheels on the tricycle - the spirit is the front wheel. As the wheel out front, when it is connected with God's Spirit, it is free to help direct our path, steering us around obstacles, and keeping us from ending up in the pit!

We may not always make the best decisions in life, but it is good to know that we have been given every resource to change those decisions and to see new outcomes.  As we connect with God's Spirit, our spirit is energized, made alive, and we can begin to see the influence of his "balance" in our daily decisions.  We may curse the place where our body and soul allowed us to end up, but we cannot accept that God put us there.  No pit is so deep he cannot rescue us from it - no despair so dark he cannot bring light into those dark spaces.  How?  Connection with his Spirit in our spirit.  Just sayin!