In Slippery Places - By Tim Burkholder

In I Peter we are told if we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, he will lift us up in due time. Many times we want that lifting up as soon as we humble ourselves, but it doesn't always work that way. Yet we can be assured that when we humble ourselves grace will come, whether it's right away or some time later. It's a promise.

How many of you have walked through a slippery place? We have all watched people slip and fall. They are walking along and suddenly one foot goes out and their hands go up and, if they are fortunate, they recover their balance. If not they land hard. We've also watched cars lose control. They hit a slippery place and go first one way, then another, then spin around and probably end up in the ditch.

When we hit slippery places in the Christian life, we must be careful not to lose control, to watch carefully and maintain our traction. If we wreck, we may need help getting out of the ditch. We may end up injured.

The slippery places are not necessarily something we have done wrong. Sometimes we enter those places because of our own fault and other times they are simply in the road before us. Last night I hit such a place and had an awful struggle getting traction again.

Are you spinning out of control? Are you in the ditch? Do you need a doctor? Let me urge you not to just sit in your car and wait for help. At least get the door open and call for help, and if you can start to shovel yourself out.

Hebrews 2:1 says, "Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip." You know, if you hit an icy spot in your car and stomp on the brakes, it seems the car goes all the faster, doesn't it? It just slips and slides all the more and you lose control. We have to know the proper ways to maintain control in the slippery spots and do all we can to maintain straightness. Last night I sat and talked with my wife for a long time trying to get traction again in a certain area of my life. This morning I feel I am getting some traction. But I had to work hard to get off the ice. Don't stay in the slide! Do something to get back on track.

Hebrews tells us to "give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard." Verse 2 continues: "For if the word spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward. . . ." After every slippery spot there is some kind of recompense, some kind of reward. If we have maintained our traction, we keep right on driving. Our hearts may be beating a little bit and our wives may sit beside us gasping, wondering how we got into such a predicament, but we're still going. But if we don't maintain our traction there is the kind of reward we don't want, the just result of our failure.

So we need verse 3: "How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?"

Most of you know my driveway is long and steep, making it difficult to get in and out in the winter, so my neighbor told me to get a truckload of small gravel and dump it on the icy spots for traction. He offered to lend me his truck whenever I wanted. What, like that gravel, helps us maintain our traction in the spiritual slippery spots? The Word of God. When all else is sinking sand or slippery snow, the Word of God gives us traction again, our salvation "spoken by the Lord" that we are not to neglect.

We can't get that traction any other place. Not from a psychologist or philosopher or any of man's wisdom. If we want traction in our spiritual life, we'll find it only in the Word. We need to start using it and walking by it. How many times have you been in a slippery spot and when you read a verse it straightened you out? Verse 2 says the word spoken by angels was stedfast. It was sure.

Let's look at some of the slippery spots described in the Word. The first is told about in Psalm 73: envy. When we compare what we have with what somebody else has, we stand in danger of slipping on envy. Here the Psalmist compares himself to the rich.

He begins with good wisdom and good traction: "Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart." We need to cling to that truth to keep straight, for when we get to the slippery place of envy it seems God isn't good enough anymore. What he has blessed us with isn't enough. The Psalmist describes his own such experience in the next verse: "But as for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped." If you see somebody really slip, his feet both come up in the air and his arms go out wide. The Psalmist here is pretty much up in the air.

Verse 3: "For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no bands in their death: but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men; neither are they plagued like other men."

Did you ever wish you didn't have to go through so much trouble? How many times have we looked at people who aren't even trying, people who haven't humbled themselves in the least, and their biggest dilemma is what program to watch on television? We look at them and wonder, "What's the use? I'm putting myself through all this, trying to bear my cross, and they get all the good things in life."

Though they are described as prideful, violent, and corrupt, they have all they could hope for. Verse 7: "Their eyes stand out with fatness: they have more than heart could wish."

The Psalmist works up to the inevitable question: "Behold, these are the ungodly who prosper in the world; they increase in riches. Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency." When we observe the injustice in the world, we approach a slippery spot and need insight from the Word to maintain our traction. That insight begins in verse 16: "When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me; Until I went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places: thou castedst them down into destruction."

So we find the ones truly in the slippery places are the ones who appear to have so much now. Their icy pride will cast them into the ultimate ditch of destruction. When we consider their end, we regain our footing and find strength to keep on the straight and narrow path.

Verse 22: "So foolish was I, and ignorant: I was as a beast before thee. Nevertheless I am continually with thee: thou hast holden me by my right hand. Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory. . . .My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever. . . .I have put my trust in the Lord God, that I may declare all thy works."

The Word gives us ample traction for the slippery slope of envy. Part of that traction is trust. Part is contentment. Truly God has been good to each of us, and we need not look at others with envy.

The other day I was stuck in my driveway, tires spinning. I flung some ashes on the road, revved the engine, and felt the tires grab. There's not much better feeling than when the car jerks and starts to move again, is there? It feels good to get traction in your spiritual life, too. You stop spinning and stop throwing snow around and move forward. The Word gives us that traction.

Another slippery spot is described in Genesis 25 in the story of Esau. As you know he was the first born, "red all over like a hairy garment," followed by his twin brother Jacob grasping his heel. Esau became a cunning hunter and man of the fields while Jacob dwelled in tents. Isaac loved Esau but Rebecca loved Jacob.

Esau came in from the fields one day faint and discouraged, tired and downcast. He asked Jacob to feed him, and Jacob agreed--IF he gave up his birthright. Esau agreed and the exchange was made.

My struggle this week was like Esau's struggle. I was down and discouraged. That's a slippery spot, because it's easy to give up on the Christian life. We get to the point where it looks better to sin than to just keep on trying. We're faint and wishing for a little relief, some contentment and happiness, and we see something we know we should resist but we end up latching onto it. It's slippery. We need to grab the Word and get some traction. Someone testified this morning, "I endured it." When we're in that slippery spot it won't work to try to rip through it, because we'll lose control and end up in the ditch. We must go slow and steady, with caution, with the Word. Esau tried to rip through the tough spot to get something to satisfy him at any cost, some immediate relief. He lost his birthright.

We're not trying to keep up with each other. You don't have to look as happy as everybody else. You don't have to testify every time somebody else testifies. Slow down. Keep in control.

It's like I told my wife last night: "I know it's going to get better, because the ice patch can't be that long." Friday night it seemed long. I drove and drove and it didn't get any better. In fact it only got worse. But the next day it began to get better. If we humble ourselves under God's hand, in due time he'll lift us up.

The next slippery spot is described in Judges 16. Samson struggled with a love in his life, Delilah, just as any love in our life can be a slippery spot. If we allow our affections to lead us astray, they will take the very strength from us.

The Philistines asked Delilah to find out Samson's source of great strength. His first answer was a lie: "If they bind me with seven green withs that were never dried, then shall I be weak, and be as another man." You know, brothers and sisters, right here is when he started to fishtail. The back of his car slid out and he corrected the slide by telling a lie. Then, instead of turning to God for traction, he continued on his reckless way. All he needed to say was, "You don't need to know where my strength comes from." But no, he loved Delilah and put her above his God-given responsibility and continued to lead her on, fishtailing one way and then another until the inevitable wreck.

Behind Delilah was a whole army waiting to trap Samson. When we get in the same spot, clinging to something we love even though we know it's bad for us, there is an army waiting to bind us up. We usually don't even notice the army. That love, that lust, that covetousness--whatever it is--looms so large in our eyes that we can't see what is behind it, waiting to capture us.

When there is something we love that makes us fishtail, it's time to get rid of it. Get out of its presence. The more we think we can handle it, the prouder we'll get and the more slippery it will get. In every instance Samson came a little closer to telling her, until finally he did tell her, and then came the mighty wreck.

Whom do you fellowship with? Are they slippery? What about your friendships? Are they pure? Hebrews 10:24 tells us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together. Don't forsake fellowship with good things. Get away from the bad. Good fellowship gives you traction. Bad fellowship sets you spinning.