The Peril of Do-It-Yourself Pslogging

I'm a do-it-yourself kind of guy. Don't knock it - I was raised that way. You know, you and I come by these annoying idiosyncracies honestly.

If you want something done right, do it yourself. Self-sufficiency is a virtue. Keep your head down, and persevere through the bumps in road. Don't draw attention to yourself, just do your thing - others will notice the things you do and pay respect to your achievements.

The psalmist describes me with remarkable accuracy in Psalm 10:5-6:

Everything always goes well for him.
So he is proud.

He says to himself, "I will always be secure.
I will always be happy. I'll never have any trouble."

Yep. That's me. I bought into the security of self-constructed success. For the better part of forty years, I lived in the facade of this happy place. And it was a really nice place to live. Had everything I needed, so I thought. Wouldn't have traded it for anything in the world.

In Psalm 10:2, the psalmist describes this attitude as "arrogance." What does he know?

Needless to say, the facade crumbled. The security failed. The do-it-yourself mentality ended up being woefully inadequate. The arrogance jumped up and bit me in the ass.

Self-sufficiency is unnecessary. It's not faithful, and it's bad theology.

The psalmist writes in Psalm 38:3-5,

Because of my sin, I'm not healthy.
My guilt has become too much for me.
It is a load too heavy to carry.
My wounds are ugly. They stink.
I've been foolish. I have sinned.

When the self-sufficiency began to crumble, I really resonated with what the psalmist writes in Psalm 38:8. "I am weak. I feel as if I've been broken in pieces."

The burdens of life are more than any one of us can carry on his or her own. God doesn't expect us to carry life's loads alone, and God doesn't really want us to try. To try is ultimately foolish.

Not to mention the guilt and illness that inevitably attaches itself along the way. To try bearing this alone is to try something I'm not created to do or capable of doing.

God is not far away, and God is waiting to help. I'm learning to give up the need to do it all by myself. It's a process, and I'm not all the way there yet. But early experiences tell me that it's going to be a happier place than anything I can create on my own.