Thoughts and Ponderings

"Why do we fall, Bruce? So that we may learn to pick ourselves up again"

- from Batman Begins

I watched this film with my sister today and remembered again how much I love that line. How apt it has been in so many instances of my life.

There's a lot to be said for pushing through when things get tough, for never giving up and never quitting, for following Roosevelt's advice: "when you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on!". Much of the American dream is hinged on the ideas of persistance, survival, and fighting for what you want.

And yet we fall, we all fall. The beginning of time had barely taken its first breath before 'The Fall' happened. Humanity has been stumbling and falling throughout every era of history. Yet we will talk endlessly about the struggling, fighting, surviving and eventual winning in history, but we rarely ever talk about the falling.

Why is this? Why do we downplay our defeats, our despair and our suffering? I believe that our failures have the potential to shape us far more than our victories. Previous failures give future victories significance.

The whole point of falling is not just to learn to stand up again, but to learn to always stand up again, for we will fall multiple times. Our sinful nature will trip us up often. But as C.S. Lewis says in his book 'Mere Christianity', "After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again."

I have fallen, and have been flat on my face for some time. I lay in limbo, there at rock bottom, not willing to take God's hand, but not willing to ask for a shovel either. I was hesitant to even attempt to enter His presence, weighed down as I was by my own guilt and selfishness. And yet, as Rick Warren states in 'The Purpose Driven Life', "our most intimate experiences of worship will likely be in our darkest days". I realized that God, perfect, righteous, high and holy as He was, had followed me into the dark. He had sat with me and cried with me, had held onto me in my doubt and despair, had followed me into places that seemed unthinkable. "Here, God? You followed me here?"

Yes, He had, because He, being infinite, is beyond what my finite mind can grasp.

He is faithful when I am not.

He is unchanging when I sway with the wind. He is solid when I am fragile.

He is good, and His love endures.

And it is because He is good, infinite, faithful, solid and unchanging, and especially because

He loves me that I can and will get up again.

I will press on for that which He saved me for and called me to be.

Lord, thank You for Your love. Thank You for the opportunities that You have placed before me. Thank You for never giving up on me. Thank You for being everything that I'm not.

I love You. Please teach me to love You better. Amen.