Feb 25
I’ve Fallen and Won’t Get Up
Pr 24:16 For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth
up again:…
Yesterday we studied Joshua and why he so often rose early.
After the first battle against the city of Ai the Israelites were defeated.
Over confidence, and reliance in their own strength was part of the problem.
But the main problem was someone had sinned during the battle of Jericho and
God withheld his blessings until the sinner was found and judgment
administered. But Joshua did not know
why they had lost the battle and he was on his face, perplexed at what had
happened.
Jos 7:6 And Joshua rent his clothes, and fell to the
earth upon his face before the ark of
the LORD until the eventide,
The next verses contain the groanings and beseeching of Joshua. Oh why did this happen. Oh Lord did you bring us over here to be
killed. How awful when Israelites run
from a fight. Oh dear I just don’t know what to do. Read some of these verses in Joshua 7:6-9.
God knew what he should do. Get up!
Jos 7:10 ¶ And the LORD said unto Joshua, Get thee up;
wherefore liest thou thus upon thy face?
Fix the problem and get moving again.
Jos 7:13 O Israel:
thou canst not stand before thine enemies,
until ye take away the accursed thing from among you.
There was a problem, progress was halted, the problem was
identified, fixed and they continued on.
Joshua had learned a valuable lesson. When there is failure don’t lay on
your face confused. Seek God’s help to identify the problem, fix it even if it
is a hard thing to do, and keep on going.
I enjoy building Oak furniture. Often people ask me where I learned
to do woodworking. I usually tell them I used the “Edison Method”. I call it the “Edison Method” because of a
famous line from Edison. A reporter asked him about the development of the
light bulb, and his many failures.
“Don’t you get discouraged after 5000 failures?”
Edison quickly corrected the reporter.
“I have not failed 5000 times. I know 5000 ways that won’t
work”
That is about the way I learned woodworking. I
know about 1000 ways that won't work.
There is nothing new here today. You have heard it before.
It is Ok if you fall down. But it is not OK if you just lay there. Or falling is not the problem, staying down
is. When I was teaching adults how to operate machine tools (Lathes-Mills) and
they had just done something wrong that ruined a few hours work, I would tell
them “Well, you need to get back on that horse again.” That is from the people who train people to
ride horses. If a student falls off a horse the best thing to do is to get them
right back on the horse. But you knew
all that, didn’t you?
So why tell you what you already knew? Because someone may need to be reminded, or
you may know someone who has just experienced some failure, some fall, some
disappointment in life. They need someone to encourage them. Get up! Keep
going. After someone falls they may need
a little time to shake the dust off. But they may need your help to get back
up.
Fall seven times –
Stand up eight
Japanese
Proverb
Never, never, never,
never, give up!
Winston
Churchill
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