Heart Tracks - The Power Of The Pit

"Praise the Lord my soul, and forget not all His benefits - who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion." Psalm 103:2-4

What beautiful verses from this beautiful Psalm. Why don't we believe it's truth? Why, when those who are His are "crowned with love and compassion," do we so often, most often, live lives trapped in despair, discouragement, anger, bitterness, unforgiveness, addictions, anxiety, fear, and a myriad of other prisons? Why are they all so much more real and powerful in our lives than this great promise from His heart? I think the answer is best expressed by Ann Voskamp, who asked this question of herself; "Because you believe in the power of the pit." We recognize the binding power of the pit far more than the freeing grace of Christ. Why?

Voskamp gives a reason that most of us will not care to entertain. The feelings we experience in the pit can be very satisfying. Holding onto anger, bitterness, unforgiveness, these can all be very comforting to our flesh. They give us a real sense of control too. So can fear, stress, and anxiety. As long as we hold these, and any other denizen of the pit, He doesn't. In truth, we're not holding them at all. They're holding us. And all the while our pit gets deeper, darker, and we become more and more dead to His freeing grace and presence.

As I write this, I'm reminded of something a friend shared just yesterday. He'd received a note from a friend telling him of something she'd read; of how a man whose wife was suffering from Alzheimer's told him that she feared that one day the disease might advance to the place where she could no longer remember Jesus. For this good woman, that was a pit of unending darkness. The husband took a moment and then said to her that even if such a thing did happen to her, she could live in the truth that even in that place, Jesus Christ would never forget her. He knew her name. He knows our name. He's the God who sees us, even in the pit. Even when our pit keeps us from seeing Him. And He is the One who will lift us from that pit, and all it's miry clay, and set us upon His Life. His Life of wholeness, joy, and peace in Him. Our pit, whatever form it may take, may hold power over us. It can never hold power over Him.

Where, in any aspect of our lives, are we living under the power of the pit? Where do we seek to maintain control, and suffer untold pain because of it? Where have peace, joy, contentment, hope, been stolen because some demon of the pit has convinced us that the pit is where we must stay? Here's the joyful and blessed news. He stands at the very edge of our pit and reaches down to us that He may lift us up to Him. This is the very picture of redemption. All our striving will not get us out of the pit, but with a word from Him and the giving of His hand of love, He can. He does. He will.....Renounce the power of the pit. Embrace the power and love of the Christ. Our pits can make us forget Him, but they will never be able to make Him forget us. At His Word now, come out of the pit.

Blessings,
Pastor O