Psalm 49:7-8a

"Really! There's no such thing as self-rescue,

pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.

The cost of rescue is beyond our means..."

Psalm 49:7-9a (The Message)

Self-rescue. How many of us hate to ask for help, thinking we can fix a problem in our lives 'on our own'. We believe that makes us "strong". Well, it doesn't. And sometimes it's just plain foolishness and self-centeredness. We cannot rescue ourselves. From death or sometimes even from certain situations in our lives. The cost of our rescue is beyond what we can humanly do by ourselves. 

I've tried to do things on my own, refusing to share with others what's going on in my life because I don't want people to think of me as weak. Guess where that got me? In a very weak spot, indeed! God has this way of bringing us to our knees when we need it the most. ;-)

God is our rescuer. Sometimes He rescues us without using humans and sometimes he rescues us using other humans. No matter how He does it, we need to recognize that it is HIM doing it, not ourselves. God has rescued me three times from the hand of death. Each of those three times was made worse because I was afraid to ask for help. I was afraid to tell people what I was thinking or how I was feeling because I was so afraid to appear weak. Well, in my weakness, He is strong. He saved me from doing something really foolish and put the right people in my life to help bring me back into relationship with Him. 

I tried to pull myself up by my bootstraps. And I failed. The cost of my rescue was beyond my means. I praise God for that so that He gets all the glory for my life today.