Everyone Stumbles

I have blogged before on the subject of none of us being perfect, but I was reminded today that everyone stumbles occasionally. I think that’s interesting, because I have been listening to Natalie Grant’s song, “I Will Not Be Moved.” The chorus of that song says, “I will stumble, I will fall down / But I will not be moved. / I will make mistakes / I will face heartache / But I will not be moved. / On Christ the solid rock I stand / All other ground is sinking sand / I will not be moved.”

Proverbs 24:16 tells us that a righteous man falls seven times, and gets back up, but a foolish man only falls once. Well, okay, I’m paraphrasing somewhat, but the idea is that it isn’t about how many times you fall, it’s about how many times you get back up. When you stop getting back up, that’s when you have a problem.

Of course, part of the process is repentance. Some people think that repentance is simply asking for forgiveness. It’s not. Repentance is like a U-turn: Having come to the realization that one is headed down the wrong road, one turns around and gets back on the right road. Should God forgive someone who isn’t sorry for what they did? If one were sorry for what one has done, wouldn’t one take steps to ensure that it doesn’t happen again? Don’t misunderstand me; I realize that many people make the same mistakes over and over again (been there, done that).

Let’s suppose for a moment that the sin that we are talking about is drunkenness. Our hero (and you won’t often hear me refer to a drunk as a hero) realizes that he has a problem, so he gets rid of all the booze in his house. That’s a good start, but he continues to hang out at bars with his buddies. Most nights, it doesn’t take very long before he doesn’t feel very sociable drinking ginger ale, especially after the third or fourth glass. After several months, he comes to the realization that, although he has “repented” of his drunkenness, he is still getting hammered three or four nights a week. He may feel completely justified in saying that he has repented, but, let’s face it, he hasn’t changed very much. What he hasn’t come to understand, yet, is that the time for him to decide whether or not to have a drink is before he steps into the bar. It’s pretty much inevitable that, if he goes in, he’s going to eventually talk himself into having “just one.” It’s equally inevitable that the one drink will talk him into a second one, and so on.

Now, you may think that I’m down on alcohol. I used drunkenness as an example because I think that we can easily see that progression. Maybe your problem is pornography, and you need to get the internet out of your house, and make sure you aren’t going anywhere that might expose you to your vice. Maybe your problem is soap operas, and you need to get rid of your TV, and arrange your beauty shop appointments later in the day (and, no, I don’t think all soap opera addicts are women, or that all women who are soap opera addicts go to beauty shops; I’m just saying). There’s a scene in “Jungle Fever” where Wesley Snipes’ character, an architect, objects to being assigned a white secretary. His bosses are a little surprised at this show of bigotry, and remind him that they can’t hire and fire based on color, only on qualifications—they would get in hot water with the EEOC. As the movie progresses, though, we find out that it isn’t a problem of bigotry: Snipes’ character knows that he has a weakness for women that are not his color, and he is trying to protect himself and his marriage. That was a show of wisdom on his part, and maybe, if he had been more open with his bosses about why he felt he needed a secretary of color, they might have been able to work something out, or at least made sure that he never wound up working late with her and nobody else around.

My point is, everybody makes mistakes. God forgives mistakes. God can even forgive the same mistake a number of different times. If one makes a mistake and realizes that this circumstance represents a weakness in one’s own spiritual armor, then one needs to take steps to protect oneself in the future. That is part of repentance. On the other hand, if one finds oneself making the same mistake over and over and don’t feel that it indicates a personal weakness, then one might want to consider the possibility that one is related to Cleopatra, because she was the Queen of Denial.

Addictions

When you talk about addiction, most people automatically think about drugs. Certainly drug addiction is a serious problem, but there are other addictions. Some people don't think of alcohol as a drug, but it is, and so alcoholism is just another drug addiction. Nicotine is also a drug, but it is generally more habit-forming than addicting. Part of the problem is that different people are susceptible to different things. One person may be able to smoke for awhile, and then stop for awhile, and then pick it up again, while another person may suffer withdrawal symptoms within hours after putting out a cigarette; for one, it's a habit, for the other, it's an addiction.

But drugs are not the only thing. For some people, gambling is an addiction. Granted, there is a certain amount of thinking that they just need one quick win to get ahead, and then they will stop; but the more they gamble, the more they lose, and the bigger the win needed to get out of the hole, and then, on the rare occasion that they actually get that big win, then they develop the attitude that they can afford to gamble now, they have money, and end up losing everything anyway. Casinos don't exist to make their customers rich--they exist to make their owners rich.

Some people find pornography addicting. Psychologists say that the appeal of pornography is that one can engage in sexual activity without actual having to go through the social activity that normally leads to the emotional closeness that should lead to, well, I'll say marriage, even though most psychologists probably don't consider marriage to be a mandatory precursor to sexual activity... The problem, of course, is that God has given us a desire to procreate: We, being the basically simple-minded people that we are, have turned that into a simple desire for sex, at least on the surface. Below the surface, though, there is a desire to see our genes, our DNA, in the children that will eventually grow up and, either take care of us in our declining years, or choose our nursing homes. No matter how much pornography one views, that basic need is never met: It's sort of like painting over rotting wood to cover the problem instead of replacing the wood and fixing the problem.

There is a statement commonly attributed to John D. Rockefeller (although I can't find anything to directly link him to the quote), that, when asked "How much money does it take to make a man happy?" he replied, "Just a little bit more." In the book of Ecclesiastes, God tells us that we will never be satisfied with increase; this doesn't just apply to money. Whatever action that makes one feel better, if it is not of God, will snowball; it will take more and more to achieve that same feeling, and, even then, it's a temporary feel-good type of thing, it is not satisfaction. Mick Jagger was right about that...