The Axe in our Lives
Following a post like yesterday's, it would be irresponsible of me not to attempt to leap over the bar that I attempted to raise. That being said, I am more sure than anyone else how often I knock that bar off, or how often I don't even try. These are not excuses, merely realistic observations.It reminds me of quote from a great book I was reading recently:
Quote:
| "One of the great dramas in the development of the United States is the history of lumbering. It is an epic story of courage, of great hazards and difficulties overcome, of success and failure in a struggle to provide some of the necessities of mankind. And the key to that history, to that drama, is the Axe. Hand-hewn white pine built the houses for humans and the barns for their domestic animals, and a million hulks rotting in every port and on every sea-coast in the world today once took lumber and sea-power around the globe. It was the axe, even more than the rifle, that conquered the North American continent." - Robert E. Pike, "Tall Trees, Tough Men" |
What this observation illustrates is astounding.
In our lives, we seldom get the advantage of a chain saw approach to our shortcomings. No, we deal with little things, one at a time. Much like the famous axeman of previous centuries dealt with New England Pine trees.
This was the approach that God told the Israelite people to take when going into the promised land:
Quote:
| "I will send My fear before you, I will cause confusion among all the people to whom you come, and will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you. I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land. (Exo 23:27-30) |
This was our God's very practical word of instruction. Our times of greatest victory come by conquering "one tree at a time".
Robert Pike goes on to make this observation:
Quote:
| “...it was in America that the Axe reached its highest development. Nowhere else in the world was it used so much, did it undergo such change, was it adapted to so many uses.” |
This brings to mind the Scripture penned by the Apostle Paul,
Quote:
| Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; (Ph 2:12) |
Every Axeman worth his salt, hung his own Axe. He did not trust another man with his most important tool. He put the handle in himself, he helved it himself, he carried with him a proper tool to keep it sharp.
Our lives in Christ are similar to this, as the above verse infers. Walking in the Truth is in accordance to principles found in God's Word. But each one of us will give account only for our own walk.
Quote:
| "See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise" - Ephesians 5:15 "Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us..." - Hebrews 11:1 |
Posted On May 3, 2007 at 0:00 AM
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