Life's Wrinkles

 But you, Lord, do not be far from me.
You are my strength; come quickly to help me. (Psalm 22:19 NIV)

I remember my first attempt as a little girl to make my own bed.  No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t do it as neatly as my mother could.  I worked for what seemed to me to be a very long time, trying to get the wrinkles out of the top sheet.  Every time I moved one wrinkle out, more appeared somewhere else.  I got so frustrated I began to cry and went to my mother for help.  I wanted to watch exactly how she did it, so I could get the same results next time.  I knew I could do it on my own… I just needed to know the correct steps.  So I watched as mom flicked the sheet high over my head and let it fall to the bed without a wrinkle.  Now I knew how she did it, but I also knew that I wasn’t physically able to do what she did.  I knew that if I wanted my bed to look perfect, I was going to need my mom’s help.

Without God, our lives are as wrinkled as those bed sheets.  We can take care of ourselves after a fashion, but no matter how hard we try, we can’t get the wrinkles out by ourselves.  Maybe we even know the steps… we’ve seen God work before.  We know what we must do.  But there is just no possible way we can do it by ourselves.  We have to have God’s help.

The question is… how long will it take us to figure it out?  Will we just keep shifting the wrinkles around in our life? Will we fall to the floor in a crumpled heap crying and throwing a tantrum because we can’t get the right results?  Or will we go to our Father and ask for his help?  He’ll give us the results we seek but can’t get on our own.

Father,
We are so prideful.  Help us to realize that we can’t do it all ourselves and that we only have to get your help when we find ourselves overcome with life’s wrinkles.  Amen.