Loose Footing

 

 

 

 

Quicksand warning sign near Lower King Bridge, Western Australia, Hughesdarren - Own work

 

"Save me, O God!

For the waters have come up to my neck.

I sink in deep mire,

where there is no foothold;

I have come into deep waters,

and the flood sweeps over me.

I am weary with my crying out;

my throat is parched.

My eyes grow dim

with waiting for my God."

- Psalm 69:1-3 (ESV)

Of all the complaints evoking empathy this day, the words, "no foothold," resound to the heart of the self-sufficient "doer," who is thrown off-balance by life and must learn lessons of trust and dependence.

 

In many ways. it is only by losing false footholds that we ever learn anything about grounding ourselves in more solid soil or better still, solid rock.

 

We are living in a land of loose footing in a time of shifting sands.

 

We are being enveloped by quicksand and even on dry ground, we are losing our balance.

 

Solid is the rock beneath it, but we sense it not. It is buried deep beneath the unsettled soil of our unsettled souls.

 

We are muddled in mire and befuddled with our own ire.

Sinking in our stinking thinking, linked to despair and

On the brink of falling, falling, falling.

Up to our necks, wrecks in the wreckage of time.

Weary cries and dreary sighs.
Why? We cry "Why!?"

Life seems like a lie.

 

Then, having called out to God, we find sudden, unexplainable peace as if, by the mere act of encounter, we are comforted and find stability.

 

"Save me, O God!"

This is our prayer of the moment from shaky ground.

 

From this ground, we find ourselves grounded in God.