Redeeming Love: A 5-Day Devotional by Francine RiversSample

Little by Little

It’s happened to all of us. We’re stuck in a bad situation or habit, and we long to escape. We finally see a way to freedom—but we don’t take it. We continue struggling, captive, 

haunted by missed opportunities, looking back at the escape we passed and asking ourselves, Why didn’t I take the way out? 

In Romans 7, the apostle Paul wrote about the gap between what we want to do and what we actually do:

I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! (verses 21–24)

Like Paul, we know what we should do, yet so often we don’t do it. We follow our own desires instead of God’s. We live by fear instead of by trust. As Paul so aptly said, there is a war inside us. Fortunately, Paul’s words don’t end there: 

Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 7:24–25) 

When you find yourself stuck, telling yourself, I should have . . . after you’ve turned away from being rescued, take heart. Remember that Jesus is the one who will free you. He is capable of using even your failures to work in you. 

Philippians 1:6 gives us this promise: “I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.”

God will not give up on us when we turn our backs on Him and return to sin. He continues to work in us, changing our hearts little by little until we are finally ready to be set free. 

Think of a time when you didn’t take an opportunity to be rescued from a bad situation or a sinful habit. What made you turn away from being rescued? Talk to God, thanking Him for His work in your life and asking Him for courage to move forward and accept His rescue.