Pull Yourself Up by Your Bootstraps?

We live in a society that teaches us to rescue ourselves in times of trouble.  If we see a person who is having a hard time, we often think that they should "get it together" and "Pull themselves up by their bootstraps."  We put an awful lot of confidence in human strength.

I love the way that David puts it in the Psalms when he says:

So why should I fear in bad times, hemmed in by enemy malice, 

Shoved around by bullies, demeaned by the arrogant rich?  

Really! There's no such thing as self-rescue, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. 

The cost of rescue is beyond our means, and even then it doesn't guarantee.  

The cost of rescue is beyond our means.   But the beauty is that we have One who paid the that price -- the price that is beyond our means.  

Paul sums it up best in Philippians three when he says:

The real believers are the ones the Spirit of God leads to work away at this ministry, filling the air with Christ’s praise as we do it. We couldn’t carry this off by our own efforts, and we know it.   

If we recognize that whatever we are in the midst of, trying harder, pushing harder, thinking harder isn't the answer.   Instead, filling the air with Christ's praises and working away at our ministry, whatever it is that God has given us, and recognizing that He is the one who paid the price... that is the answer.

For after all, He is the one who is mighty to save.