God's Uplift for the Downcast

An adult who trips on a carpet edge can suffer serious injury, but a tiny baby learning to walk will fall frequently with little or no injury. Why? Because of the baby’s minimal body size and its closeness to the floor. By analogy, a truly humble soul—one who is “lowly before the Lord”—may fall by sinning through human weakness, but his spirit is less vulnerable to lasting damage than a soul who is less “upright” (pun intended).

With a pertinent psalm in mind, I playfully “poetized” that theme with this quirky little dithyramb:

The humble sometimes stumble,
But it’s not a harmful bumble,
Their faith would never crumble,
Over such a “baby tumble.”
They may cry but never grumble
Over every careless fumble,
They regret, of course, their bumble,
But their soul is not bejumbled
With excuses weakly mumbled.
Though raging demons grumble
With this psalm the heavens rumble:
“The Lord upholds the humble.”

That schmaltzy little ditty might be regarded as a poetic commentary on Psalm 147:6: “The Lord upholds the humble, but casts the wicked to the ground.” Solomon counterpoints the outcome of the non-lowly: “A haughty spirit goes before a fall.” (Prov. 16:18). But restoration of the fallen is always available to the contrite, as Isaiah reminds us (57:15), “For he restores the contrite and the lowly in spirit.” Thus, the Lord prevents the fall by “upholding,” but restores the fallen by “uplifting.” Notice the need for humility to induce divine intervention in either case.

Surprisingly, God’s word has even more to say about our human weakness in failure and discouragement, offering assurance and support for his weak but “lowly” children. Psalm 37:23-24 oozes with God’s love and patience in parenting us spiritual toddlers who are always learning to walk in the Lord, sometimes stumbling or tumbling without hurt: “If the Lord delights in a man’s way, he makes his steps firm; though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with his hand.” Our gentle Father God couldn’t be more loving and parentally solicitous than that!

Our response should be simple and childlike, addressing the Almighty himself as “Our Father,” and leaning on him for his protective support when facing opposing forces: “Deliver us from evil.” The “bookend overtures” that open and close the Lord’s Prayer encompass his solicitude for the whole range of God’s parenting protection. We start by invoking his parental status as our loving Father and close by affirming our reliance on him to deliver us from evil—spiritual dangers that could lead to a fall. David almost highlights this appeal of dependence on our heavenly Father in Psalm 13:4-5: “My foes may rejoice when I fall, but I trust in your unfailing love.”

“Falling down” (spiritual downfalls) and “getting up” (being restored) are part and parcel of the life of almost all of us; we’re “roller-coaster sinners” who are striving to become saints. To cite the overused pun, we all have, like the elevator, our “ups and downs.”

David, for example, was a great saint of the Old Covenant—having composed most of the psalms of the Bible, and even used them to “exorcise” Saul from an evil spirit of depression. Yet he was also a great sinner, sinning by adultery with Bathsheba, and sinning by murder—killing her husband, Uriah (conspiratorially). Yet later, when humbly repentant, he wrote in Psalm 18 about God’s merciful “uplift”: “He reached down from on high and took hold of me…He rescued me...”

Countless great saints were also great sinners, beginning with the first pope, who authored two Spirit-inspired books of the Bible and embraced martyrdom, but only after having denied his very Savior three times and having abandoned him at his death on Calvary.

Of course between falling and rising, repentance is the trigger that releases the Lord’s cleansing and restoring mercy—a divine “uplift” after the “downfall.” Proverbs 24:16 reminds us that “though a righteous man falls seven times [symbolically, “multiple times”] he rises again.” Thus, God promises to rescue (restore) a fallen righteous person, or uphold that person (that is, prevent a fall, or perhaps allow a stumbling without falling).

Thus, sincere repentance can result in a “sinner-to-saint” transformation. However, non-repentance can result in a tragic “saint-to-sinner” debasement. That’s what happened to Saul. Saul was a holy Spirit-filled prophet-king (I Sam. 10) who fell into the sin of murderous jealousy and participated in a séance before finally committing suicide. If he had been “contrite and lowly in spirit” (humbly repentant), he would have taken the path of “sinner-to-saint”—like repentant David, whom he sought to kill.

God’s uplifting and upholding is available to all sinners, but unfortunately many—probably most—are not open to that avenue of mercy. “God’s Uplift for the Downcast” for us Christians is the love magnet of the Crucified Jesus: “When I am lifted up I will draw all men to myself” (John 12:32). By his being lifted up on the cross (v. 33), he is disposed to “lift up” the fallen sinners—all of us—from the quicksand of sin. A crucifix optimally portrays “God’s Uplift for the Downcast” (see Galatians 3:1).

Let us all—all of us sinners—come in profound humility—to the foot of the Cross to be “uplifted” to the bleeding Heart of our crucified Savior.