When life knocks you down

I mean what do you do when life snowballs and crashes into you all sharp-edged and heavy? And not even strong, I-got-this-right-now you. Your weakest you. 

And, of course, you've had no choice but to let your guard down--Life is in two-hands-necessary mode right now. Work and home, and church, and things, and people, and worries, and possibilities, and...all these fill your arms like a massive load of laundry.

And stuff keeps dropping from the pile. Necessary stuff. Things you need to make life match. To keep it well dressed. Crouch down to snatch up what's fallen? Something else's going to topple off. 

That's when it will come. 

And crouching there with your mounded life, you feel it full on: the avalanche of a thousand sharp-edged don't forgets, and need-nows, what-ifs, and not-enoughs. 

What are we going to do then? 

Because in that moment when life holds us smashed under it's deep pile, that's when we're going to hear the hum of Satan's whispers. 

Lie #1 You've got to get back up without dropping one thing. 

If you don't, all of life's gonna implode. Just going to collapse in a wicked-witch-of-the-north heap and you're going to lay there smoldering in failure and shame while people stare in morbid curiosity and pity. Right? 

Lie #2 You're never going to be able to handle life. 

You're how old now? When are you going to grow up/man up/clean up/shape up? People all around you do life so easily. Naturally. Never get thrown down and plowed under. Just quit now. You'll never get like that.

Lie #3 God doesn't love smashed-down, weak people.

I mean let's be honest, we don't. We call them high-maintenance, life-suckers, black holes. We avoid them. And if life shoves us up against them we endure them. Why would God be any different? 

Lie #4 You're useless to God. 

Immobilized under the crushing weight of life? What could God do with that.

And as these whispers swirl and hiss about you,

you're going to need truth. 

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Burdens weren't meant to be carried.  

They were meant to be cast. What makes these things so heavy anyway? The responsibility of them. So one by one, cast the responsibility for the success, timing, and care of these life-things on arms that already "uphold the government of worlds." And as you move forward, He has promised to sustain. Whether things drop or not. Ps. 55:22

You can handle life with Christ's strength. 

Take a look at Prov. 24:16: 'A just man falls seven times and rises up again." Notice it says that he falls. We have to change our definition of handle, friends. Handling life doesn't mean perfection. It doesn't mean no crashing. It's not going to look like that airbrushed billboard the world shoves in front of us. According to the Word of God, successfully handling life means we get up again. And looking to Him for strength, we can do that. Every time. 

 God delights in loving the weak.

God so loved the world that couldn't save itself. God demonstrated His love towards sinners. In due time, Christ died for the ungodly. And what about those who keep messing up and turning to their own ways? God laid on Christ all of their iniquity. That is who God loves. He loves those who are incapable. In salvation and sanctification. His steadfast loves endures even in your weakest.

 God uses those who are bad at life. 

Look closely at Hebrews 11. Most in the "hall of faith" had lives pocked with failures, weaknesses, discouragement, getting-smacked-down-and-getting-up-again. And what is God's commentary? He brags on them. As if to say, "just look how I used them. Used them because they acted on what they believed about Me. They did in faith." 

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And at the end of the day, it's not what we're going to do: If we can weather the knock down, how much our arms can hold, how fast we get up, how strong we feel...What matters is this: Am I doing in faith? Believing what is true about God? Believing that He will sustain me, enable me to get up again, love me no matter what, will use me even in my weakest? 

Dear friends, with faith it is possible to please Him. 

Whether life knocks us down or not. 

Beth