This morning I gave some thought to what it means to need, ask for, and receive help. Or refuse help when it is offered. Help during a time of need, a period of anguish, a season of confusion, or even a wave of change. When you least anticipate it or bravely request it. I know this must resonate with you. Because help is the thing we so often need yet so much more often deny. What a shame that is and I am committing to changing. Asking for help not only impacts me, but sweetly impacts the helper, who is spiritually developed through their giving. Yes, a friend in being able to help also recieves a blessing.
I have been persistent to encourage my friends and family to ask for help...assuring them it is an honor for me to help carry their burdens. Eager to help others, fix what is wrong. Encourage them to grab on. But yet, in a time of need, I find it difficult myself to reach for a willing hand. Hard to grab the life jacket when my friends have jackets to spare. You know what I mean.
Maybe our problems are too insignificant when there are so many others with greater needs. Or we just don't want to burden our friends with small issues when they have their own. Don't want to drag others into the murky muddy pit with us. Or, asking for help might make us look weak and unable to handle our own business. Worse still is the ambivalence that we even need help in the first place - an inability to see our situation from the outer ring and realize we are so unequipped for the occasion.
Not asking for (or accepting) help can be incredibly unhealthy. It might be fueled by pride, lead to isolationism, leave us unprotected in battle. The truth is, asking for help acknowledges our needs, and that takes strength. And our needs, as broken people, in a fallen world, are many.
God never intended for us to be alone and went so far as creating billions of options for us to be in relationship with another human. I mean, we have options. God designed us to encounter others, share burdens, lend a hand and receive well. This is being in community. We don't have to be confused or unsure of it: God started this relationship-building with Eve, created as a helper to Adam. It was in the beginning.
It is not good for man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him. Genesis 2:18
If you are still unable to really grasp your own need for help or ask for help that you need, remember that Jesus came to display our deep need for Him. We are not able to save ourselves, so God sent His Son. We are not able to fully care for ourselves alone, so God sent your friends. God accomplishes great miracles and delivers people from many valleys all with the help of others.
Consider Moses. Or David.
Have you ever heard the metaphor of the man on the roof? It's a good one. So a man on the roof is trying to escape rising floodwaters. He is praying to God to send help. A short time later and boat goes by and offers to rescue the man. He declines, yelling out "I am ok, I am waiting for God to rescue me!" A short time later, another boat goes by and offers to help. The man again yells out, "I am good...I know God is coming to rescue me!" Finally, a helicopter is overhead and dropping a line to the man. He again declines help and signals to them "I am ok to wait- God will rescue me!" As the man drowns to death and enters Heaven, he asks "God, why didn't you save me from those waters?" God simply reminds the stubborn man, "I sent two boats and a helicopter but you refused."
Have you declined a helper God sent your way? Have you denied another the opportunity to serve well? To do their part in what God has asked them to do?
Bear one another burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2
So, step out in obedience today by first acknowledging your deeply rooted need for a Savior. Then acknowledge your need for others in community. See ways you can provide opportunities for those who love you to grow, by asking and accepting the gifts they have to offer.
A great first step: ask someone you trust to pray for you to get better at asking for help. Start there. See not weakness, but God in the middle. Acknowledge your need for help by recognizing your inability to do all things, keep all the plates spinning or manage all the worlds problems. You are to steward well what you can, and share the rest of the load with others. Carry your own knapsack yes, but when it gets too heavy to carry you will have to employ another set of hands or your back will break. You will grow in the process.
God will teach you glorious things and free you of exhaustion.
I am going to pray for you, and for myself, to be more willing to ask for help. To be able to identify areas that need all hands on deck and blindspots where we exhaust our own spirit by neglecting to let others in. To be willing to make use of every opportunity to ask, serve and accept well.
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