A Little Help from A Friend

Marcia Laycock writes from central Alberta Canada. Her devotionals have been widely published and endorsed by Mark Buchanan, Jannette Oke and Phil Callaway. She is a sought-after teacher at writers' conferences and speaker at women's events. See more of her work at www.vinemarc.com

When my daughter decided to take a language course by correspondence I had some trepidation. Would she have the self-discipline to finish it? Could she really learn a language by listening to audio recordings and reading a book? She dove in with enthusiasm at first, but quickly got bogged down. I did my best to encourage her to keep going. We were working on an assignment together one morning when she looked up and said, “You know Mom, I really want to know how to speak Spanish. I just don’t want to have to learn it!”

I’ve thought of that day often over the past few months. It’s been a struggle to get my next novel finished. I so want it to be finished. I dream of seeing the book in my hands and on the shelves of many bookstores. But right now I have little of the enthusiasm I need for writing it.

Most writers hit this wall, when it’s just not that much fun and you have to force yourself to sit in the chair and do it. I’ve hit this point before and I know it will pass. Like my daughter, I will persevere and the book will be written. I just have to get over this hump.

Sometimes the path of our spiritual life can have a lot of humps. We want to go church, but can’t drum up the needed energy to get out the door. We want to read the Bible but there are so many distractions. Even the apostle Paul seems to have had a number of humps along the way. Hear his distress in these words – “So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:20-24).

The struggle to live as we should, to enjoy God as He intended us to do, is sometimes more than a hump. It can seem like a mountain.

But listen to what Paul says next – “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”(v.25)

Paul made it over the hump, with a little help from a friend. The good news is He’s our friend too and He’s very good at bulldozing the humps in our lives, both spiritually and physically. He cares about all of it and he wants to help. Just ask Him.