Getting Out of that Pit!

Many of you know that Beth Moore is one of my favorite authors and Bible teachers. A few weeks ago I bought her book "Get Out Of That Pit".

This past Saturday, a very dear friend confronted me on my "isolation and withdrawal" stuff and pointed out to me the effect it was having on others. As hard as it was to hear - and I am sure even harder to speak ... God used her honesty to "wake me up".

Sunday night I picked up "Get Out of That Pit" and started reading. It was as if Beth Moore had been hiding in my closet - observing my every move & reading my every thought.

I want to share with you this new journey that I have begun by sharing with you some of the things that I highlighted while reading. I don't think that any commentary on my part is needed ... the words speak for themselves. These excerpts from the book exactly describe where I have been!!!
2008 is going to be my year to Get Out of That Pit and to learn how to avoid ending up in there again!

Introduction

Pg. 2 - "We can blow it so badly we think God would just as soon we stayed under the dirt and out of the His sight. But, if we're willing to let the truth speak louder than our feelings, and long enough that our feelings finally agree, we can be far more that okay. We can be delivered to a place where the air is crisp, the enemy is whipped, and the view is magnificent."

Pg. 3 - "I am convinced that when the last chapter of each life story is recorded in the annals of heaven, people would rather have lived out their fullness of days with purpose more than painlessness."

Chapter 1 - Life in the Pit

Pg. 7 - "You don't have to stay there. Even if you've been there your whole life, you can call it a day. Even if you deserve the pit you live in, you're still not stuck there. Some things weren't meant to be accepted. A pit if one of them. Quit trying to make the best of it. It's time to get out."

Pg. 8 - "...[the pit] is a shadowy home of the heart, mind and soul so close and personal that, like mud on the set of tires, we drag it along wherever our physical circumstances move us."

Pg. 13 - "Too often we don't recognize a pit when we're in one."

"... you can know you're in a pit when ..."

1) You feel stuck (pg. 14) - see Psalm 40
2) You can't stand up (pg. 16) - see Psalm 69:2 & Eph. 6:11-13
3) You've lost vision (pg. 17) - see Eph. 1:18

You feel stuck ...
Pg. 14 - "Psalm 40 adds to the characteristics of a pit like "slimy," "muddy", "miry". Together these words tells us one critical thing about a pit: you can't get yourself out.

You can't stand up ...
Pg. 16 - "If you and I are going to be victorious people, we've got to stand with our own two feet on solid ground. One way you can know you're in a pit is that you feel ineffective and utterly powerless against attack. You can't stand up to assaults, trials or temptations because your feet are in the mud and mire."
Pg. 17 - "I bed you to see that your enemy has a tremendous investment not only in digging and camouflaging a pit in your pathway but also, should you tumble down, in convincing you to stay there after you fall.
"...we'll define a "pit" this way: a pit is an early grave that Satan digs for you in hopes he can bury you alive." Should you fall into it, make no mistake; he cannot make you stay. Ironically, neither will God make you leave. Like it or not, some things are simply up to us.:

You've lost vision ...
Pg. 17 - "A pit is so poorly lit we can no longer see things that may have once been obvious to us."

Pg. 18 - "We feel too buried in our present state to feel passionate about a promised future."
"All image-bearers of God were intended to overflow with effervescent life, stirring and spilling with God-given vision. That's partly what the apostle Paul was talking about when he prayed that the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened in order that we might know the hope to which Christ has called us (see Ephesians 1:18)."
Pg. 19 - "We've forgotten what we used to see or shrugged off those early divine encounters as something we must have made up when we were less mature."
Pg. 20 - "Getting out begins with waking up. And (this may be the hardest part) with being willing to feel again.
"Not only are wonder, hope, and vision natural when our feet are set upon a rock, but so is our vantage point from which we can see the enemy's activity around us." (see Psalm 40:2 and Psalm 27:6)

I share this with you first of all to confess that I have been in the pit without even realizing it!!!
Or maybe I did realize it - but didn't want to acknowledge it. Being in the pit gave me the feeling of being "safe" - gave me the false security in "not feeling the pain". I have been awakened and now my heartfelt prayer every day will be that God would enlighten the eyes of my heart so that I might see & know the hope to which Christ has called me ... even when I don't FEEL it.