Big Brother and I were both in high school the year Dad fell and broke his leg. He is a tough bird - he went to a basketball game with the broken leg before he went to the doctor. After visiting the doctor, his leg was in a cast and his mobility was greatly reduced.
Much to our chagrin, that meant Big Brother and I had more chores to do before we headed off to school. We were climbing out of bed at 0-dark:30 to feed the cows every morning. Big Brother always drove the pickup, because he was older and a "better driver." Did I mention it was pretty muddy at the time?
He drove the pickup up to the silage pit and we filled the back of the pickup with silage. Then we headed for the pasture to feed the cows. To get to that pasture we had to drive on a path alongside a corn field. The path was pretty muddy, but it was just slick - not deep. On that particular morning, Big Brother slid in the sloppy-mud a little too much and slid off the path into the corn field. Unlike the path, it was a deep and sticky mud!
Being a "better driver" and headstrong, he was determined to drive back out. We were in 4-wheel drive, so he gave it the gas and attempted to pull back up to the path. No dice. He threw it in reverse and gunned it and made a little progress, but was soon stopped. Back into 2nd gear and and a lot of gas and we moved forward a few feet. He tried to rock the pickup to get it out, going forward and back repeatedly. It soon became evident that we weren't going anywhere. Finally he gave up and shut the engine off.
We opened our doors and stepped out of the pickup. Notice I didn't say we stepped DOWN out of the pickup - we literally stepped out. The ground was at an even level with the floorboards. I have never seen a vehicle stuck in the mud as good as that one was!
We walked a mile back to the house and broke the bad news to Dad. We changed clothes and headed off to school, leaving Dad to figure out how to get the pickup out. When we got home that night, Dad was not very happy with us! He took the tractor over to the field and was unable to pull the pickup out with the tractor. Our neighbor had a small Caterpillar in the next field over, so he asked his neighbor to pull it out. The Cat couldn't pull it out either. It took both - the tractor and the Cat to yank that pickup, full of silage, out of the mud! Big Brother never does anything halfway!
David wrote the following words in Psalm 40, "I waited patiently for the LORD; He turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit out of the mud and mire; He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand." This life is full of mud and mire. Sin and temptations surround us on every side and threaten to pull us in where we will be unable to escape. But God has the power to break the hold of sin and temptation on our lives. He desires to set our feet on solid ground where we won't slip and slide. This type of prayer is one that God will always answer. Why would we trust anyone or anything else?
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