God Gives Life

Have you ever wanted to rescue someone? 

Not necessarily from something dramatic like a house fire or a car crash or a neighborhood pond, but just from the quiet little things that we don't tend to notice until it's too late. There's something in all of us that likes to play the hero, that likes to point out danger before someone else sees it, that wants to be the person who saves someone else from the troubles of this world. 

The problem is...we can't. Not really. Even if we know the risks and see them clearly, we still have to get someone to believe what we're saying. They not only have to believe us; they have to know that we have their best interest at heart. And most of the time, we just come off as a busybody or a know-it-all, someone who wants to feel superior to them. 

But even if we convince them that trouble is on the horizon and we can get them to steer away, we still haven't saved them. Because stopping someone from getting themselves into trouble isn't actually the key to saving someone.

Giving them life is. 

And we're even worse at that. 

We may stop someone from making a bad decision. For awhile. We may stop them from doing something stupid. This time. We might convince them to look for something else. But the truth about the bad things we do to ourselves and to each other is that we do them while we're searching for something...and when someone or something stops us from the bad things, we're still searching for the same thing that led us down that road in the first place. 

As long as that empty space or that hurt space or that broken space remains in our life, we'll keep searching. 

And it doesn't really matter what we suggest or offer or provide, we're just not capable of filling that emptiness for each other. 

John tells us we're not supposed to be. John tells us to stop trying to rescue each other. Rather, he says, when we see someone in sin - someone in trouble, someone heading down the wrong road, someone headed toward sure destruction, we should pray for them. We should get them to God.

Because God gives life to sinners (1 John 5:16). 

He's the only one who can. 

So the next time you want to rescue someone, the next time you want to play hero, the next time you really want to make a difference and keep someone from the pain and the troubles and the heartache that their waywardness, weariness, and wantonness is about to cause them...pray for them. 

It's the best thing you can do.