Falling On My Feet

It is a common expression to say, "I fell on my knees", but I just had a thought. As Christians, we are commanded, I think, to fall on our feet. When bad things happen to us, or when we choose to do bad things that have awful results, we...myself included...tend to go into serious remorse and regret. Guilt plagues us to the point that we are unable to reach God's eternal grace. So our first response is to fall on our knees. The problem that I have, is that I am prone to stay on my knees and beat myself up for weeks or longer over sin that God has already forgiven. I get deceived by this. I stay on my knees until time erodes my guilt and I begin, through my own efforts to feel better about myself. It is true that these periods of extreme remorse are also characterized by prayer, confession, and humility. But the problem occurs when we simply use time and our strength to remove or lessen the guilt that we experienced from our sin. I know this from personal experience. Inevitabally, the result of this course of action is that in no time, once the guilt has subsided, I find myself committing the exact same sin that I wish I had never done.

I think the answer to this is to learn how to fall on our feet. When we fall on our feet, we are not committing ourselves to some earthly purgatory where time will wipe away our guilt. We immediately respond to our failures by calling on God's grace and forgiveness. Of course, going to our knees in prayer is the first step in this. But for those of us who are plagued by guilt we must take the next step and get up on our feet and drive on with our walk in Christ. If we fail to gain the confidence that we must have as Christians in God's grace and power to forgive, we will live lives in which our greatest demons will continually have power over us. We voluntarily give Satan power because we cannot trust God at his word. This is very difficult for me.
I want to stay on my knees because it is easier. It is much harder to get back on your feet and walk in the light again...immediately. I would much rather feel sorry for myself, tell others what a worthless pig I am, than dust off my jeans and get back in the Christian saddle again.

We must get back in the saddle. There is no choice. We will have horrible consequences, at times, to the sins we have committed. Sometimes the consequences will seem like more than we can possibly bear. But, through Christ, all things are possible. There is nothing that can happen to you on this earth that Christ cannot overcome. God has not promised us a life of unadulterated joy on this earth. In fact, I believe that Satan is called the Prince of the Earth. God will not remove the pain that addiction has caused to your family, even though He has forgiven you. He will not take away your responsibility for the child you had out of wedlock. He will not bring back to life those you have killed emotionally or physically. But he will hold you, carry you, and open your eyes to His wisdom and His purpose for the pain we endure on this side of Heaven.

When we fall on our feet, we are able to perceive God's plans for our suffering in our life much, much faster than if we continue to stay on our knees and whine. He is our Savior, our Messiah. He has rescued us from a life where all we can see is our guilt. I do not mean to imply that we should have a flippant attitude toward the consequences of our sin. That is a sure recipe for disaster. We should feel sorrow, even anger, at ourselves for continually falling into the sin-trap. We certainly should ask God and those we have offended for forgiveness. But if we remain on our knees, we will receive God's forgiveness, but we most certainly will find ourselves in the not-too-distant future repeating the same sins against ourselves, our family, our friends, and God.

Think of it this way. Our Christian life is a struggle...a fight. That's why Paul gave us the image of a Soldier donning his spiritual armor to fight against Satan. And notice something about that armor. Paul did not just describe the helmet and breastplate. These are purely defensive weapons to protect you from the enemy. He also described the sword. The sword is an offensive weapon. We are to be on the attack against Satan. You do not fight on your knees. You fight on your feet.

When we become Christians, we do not, in my opinion, become passive residents on this planet. We do not build our lives around Deism. God has not wound up this earthly clock, with all the natural laws in place, and stepped aside to let us deal with the consequences of being human. He is active in our lives and we must be active in his kingdom. We are at war. Every day of our existence is a battle. I would venture to say that all of us will lose major battles against Satan at some point in our lives. I certainly lose battles on a daily basis. But I want to fall on my feet when I lose. I will get back up, put on my armor again, grab my sword, and go and do battle against the forces of evil that are trying to destroy me and all those I love.

*Note: I am in no way saying that we should not fall on our knees in utter despair over sins we commit. The first step to true repentence is to fall down and surrender yourself to God's mercy. It is God that puts you back on your feet. It is God that enables you to fall on your feet.