Let me start by saying something very important to the understanding of what I will be writing. This is not a religious idea. That's part of what is making this so difficult to write, because what I feel the need to say could be taken and run with in a religious direction, which could be disastrous. Just as important to remember and understand, my regular readers will know this well, I am not perfect or qualified to impart anything other than my experience, strength and hope, which all come down to the grace of God that I have experienced and that has changed my life. But I am no shining example of what you can do when you decide to get your life right and stop doing wrong. I pray that I can be an example of what God can do, because I can't do anything worthwhile on my own. My natural default is to run in the dark and never choose the light or to do what's right.
There's a story about a person with different problems, depending on who's telling the story, down in a pit. I've seen it with the pit victim being an addict, and alcoholic, and a soldier with PTSD. The idea is basically a retelling of The Good Samaritan. This alcoholic's walking down the street when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out. A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up, "Hey you. Can you help me out?" The doctor writes a prescription, throws it down in the hole and moves on. Then a preacher comes along and the guy shouts up, "Rev., I'm down in this hole can you help me out?' The preacher writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole with a Bible and moves on. Then a another alcoholic walks by and sees the drunk in the pit. He can barely muster up any hope when he cries out one last time, "Can you help me out?' And the alcoholic jumps in the hole. The drunk says, "Are you stupid? Now we're both down here." The alcoholic says, 'Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out."
This is a great little reminder that when we find freedom, whether it be from addiction or mental and emotional damage or whatever, that we have a responsibility to show others the way out. What you have freely received, freely give. There are times when a doctor can actually be a great help, and my father is one example of a preacher who has never been drunk who has counseled with and helped more than one drunk and addict. I don't mean to disparage anyone who tries to help, and I definitely am not saying that God can't use people without the same experiences, but it is true that there is something about being able to say I have been where you are, and I know the solution, I know a way out, I know how to make it stop, I am no longer bound by these chains and you don't have to be either.
But in the cute little story, the recovered person walks by and jumps in. If the two people had been stumbling home drunk together and both fallen into the hole together, the story is totally different. Now, one may think they know the way out, but the other won't listen. Why not? You're stuck the same as me! You're in the same prison, you're bound by the same chains, you're failing in the same way, and you have no more hope than I do, so why should I listen to you tell me how to get free?
Well, here's the thing, I am just as big a loser as anyone reading this, as chief and masterful sinner as anyone ever was, including Paul. And guess what? I still sin. Every day. Preachers aren't supposed to say things like that are they? Well, I wrote it, and it's true. There are times in every single day that I slip, at least momentarily, into self seeking and self will, when I choose my own way instead of God's. The perfection of my second born spirit is not yet fully manifest in my life, and I haven't met anyone who can say differently about themselves. The best Christian in the world is a sinner.
I am not who I should be, and not who I will be when God completes the work which He has begun in my life, but I am most certainly not who I once was. And that's the thing. We are indeed seeking progress rather than perfection, from glory to glory He is transforming us into the image of Christ, and today we can walk a little more closely with Him and be less bound than we were yesterday, by the grace of God. I am still a sinner, but I have learned to walk in grace by the power of the Spirit. And I learned it from others who have experienced the ability to walk without doing the things that they once did before grace.
I do still slip into selfishness and sin, the difference is that I don't do it as often, that I dip into the shallow end rather than diving into the depths, and I realize what I've done and get out a lot more quickly than I used to. I still have moments, for example, where I lose control to anger, but they are few and far between these days and no one is in danger of being physically attacked. When I first got out of prison, I was anger personified, scary angry, and there was a very real possibility that I would hurt you if you triggered my convict survival mode. Progress.
What I am trying to get across, is once you see the path to freedom, get on it. Show it others as you have the opportunity. Give away the solution that you have found. Don't wait until you're perfect to share with others how to overcome sin in your life, because that's not going to happen while you're still breathing. But you can't lead anyone out of the pit that you are also stuck in. You have to at least be moving toward the exit before someone can follow you out. You can't give away what you don't have. It's progress rather than perfection, but it is not theory and knowledge rather than perfection. Before I will listen to what you're saying about walking with God, about walking free from bondage, I need to see some progress, I need to see that you have something that I want and have not yet attained.
In How It Works, there is the call that if you want what we have, you need to do what we've done. If you're as big a mess as I am, I don't want what you have. If you are as captive as I am, then I don't need your ideas about freedom. But if you have learned to walk in the power of the spirit by grace to the point where you are free and have joy, and peace, and a life worth living, when I can see that you no longer live in the pit like me but have walked in to show me the way out, then I want what you have. Before you can help anyone else who is still suffering, you need to let God break your own chains. Surrender and walk free, and let them follow your path from the pit. You'll never help anyone find freedom chained in the dungeon with them, because your theory that God can set them free won't help nearly as much as them seeing that truth in practice.
Today let us remember that before we can tell someone how to get the speck out of their eye, we must first let God remove the plank from our own eye. Before we can tell anyone to get right with God, we must first have a repentant and broken heart ourselves, understanding that we too are in dire need of a Savior. We need to be calling people to follow us to Jesus as we run toward Him, instead of sitting in our own filth trying to tell others they need to get clean. Let us remember that we are still sinners, but by walking in grace today, we can live our life within the will of God and not do the things that detract from His will, His glory and His love. We can be shining examples of the love and power of God to set us free and give a life worth living, but it's not going to happen by speaking truth if we are not living that same truth. The 12th Step is at the end, after the spiritual awakening, for a reason. Surrender, find freedom, then share that freedom.
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