Overcoming Repetitive Spiritual Failure
Seek first Gods way of doing things, and right standing with him, and all other things will be added unto you…Matthew 6:33
Pondering today the reasoning behind spiritual failure…I am convinced that, a great majority of the time, spiritual failure is a result of un-established foundational principles…
Consider this analogy…When a building is constructed the first thing laid is the foundation…The foundation is that which gives the rest of the structure the ability to stand. If there is a flaw in the foundation it will affect the integrity of the entire structure…
Many of you reading this have probably seen the effects of a foundational flaw in your home…you will notice a crack in a wall where shifting has occurred, the problem really isn’t the wall its self, it is the shifting at the foundation which has produced the crack…You can patch the crack (cover up the spiritual problem) but if you don’t address the root of the problem (the shifting foundation), the crack will reappear in a very short time because the foundation will continue to shift, causing problems throughout the rest of the structure…
The only way to stop the crack from reappearing is to correct what is wrong at a foundational level.
Our spiritual lives are much the same way…Usually, when we fail in the spiritual arena, it is not some “surprise attack” that causes us to fall…it is the same issue over and over and over again that we just cannot seem to gain victory over…a crack in the wall that we continue to patch, but always seems to come back, flawing our appearance, and frustrating our lives…
These spiritual cracks or flaws in our lives can be directly related to foundational instability. We may have 98 percent of our foundation laid solid, but if just a small percentage of that foundation is un-established…we will see the effects of that in our lives…
It is failure in the simple things, the foundational issues in our Christian walk…Things like, taking the time daily to talk to God, Studying/meditating on his Word (I intentionally did not say “reading” his word because you can read something without being intentional in your efforts, and receive nothing from it), Listening to what he is trying to tell us through his word, and ultimately just keeping God prioritized first in our lives…
It is so easy to allow work, school, relationships, television, hobbies, etc…to take God’s place of priority in our lives, as we place Him on the back burner knowing that “He’ll be there” when we get back…but as we allow these simple foundational issues to slip, our lives begin to produce the fruit of this spiritual misalignment…Usually the result is that we find ourselves surprised and disappointed that we have, once again, fallen into the same sin that has so easily beset us so many times before…that same issue that we thought was resolved is once again laughing at us as we recognize that we have submitted to it…This circumstance, which we have all experienced, is all too often indicative of a weakness in our foundation…
A few years ago I determined that I was going to really get in shape…I began working out, put myself on a strict diet, and over the course of about a year, lost about 30 lbs of fat and put on some serious muscle…I looked good, I felt good, I was strong, my daily discipline paid off!
There were some foundational issues that had to be addressed every day in order for me to keep that figure…I didn’t reach that point and then say, “Ok I’ve arrived now, I can quit doing all the “little stuff” that got me here” (which happens often in our Christian walk)…As long as I continued to eat properly, and work out regularly, I continued to grow and was able to increase my ability to “press against” greater resistance…I remember the first time I bench pressed 300 lbs…I felt like I was on top of the world as I conquered what was, at one time, unattainable…
But then something happened, I got blindsided by dislocating my shoulder…after the injury, for a while I couldn’t work out at all, but when I got back into the gym I no longer could do what I once was able to do…I could feel the pain of the injury every time I attempted to regain what was lost and became discouraged…Anybody ever been there?
With the discouragement came a failure to stick with the foundational disciplines…I began to slip on my diet, I worked out less and less, I got weaker and weaker, and now, HELLO BELLY!
The great thing is “Hello Belly” is not the end of the world, all I have to do is go back to the basics, reestablish the foundational disciplines, and I CAN rebuild…
SO CAN YOU!!! Yes it will take some time, and yes it will take some discipline, and no it probably won’t be the most comfortable thing in the world…Your flesh does not like to be disciplined…BUT THE REWARD IS WORTH IT!!!
Go back to the basics…reestablish and strengthen that foundation, by seeking God first in your life, studying his word daily, and communicating with him…and live a victorious life!
You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you!…Philippians 4:13