I Forgot My “Nevertheless!”

Recently, I had a friendship in which I was “unequally yoked.”  For some reason, with this person, I just wasn’t handling things as I wanted to, and I would spend nights upset with myself for not being the Christian I felt I should be.  Part of being a mature Christian is knowing your own limitations and building your life in such a way as to help yourself make the right decisions.  It was time to end this friendship instead of continuing to hope that I would just stop making poor decisions.  If you’re an alcoholic, and your drive home from work takes you past a bar that you keep stopping in for a drink, at some point you need to just find a new way home.  It’s okay to be weak.  We are all weak (but made strong through Christ! 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 NKJV).

“No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” (I Corinthians 10:13)

The trap I fell into, which I think is common, was wanting God to make MY door where I wanted it.  I prayed, begging God to have this person find another friend and get so distracted with them that I could just fade away into the background and quietly disengage from them having such influence over me.  I likened my desire to Jesus in the garden when He begged God that He would not have to go through His death on the cross.  I was truly dedicated to this decision to stop being friends (but I didn’t want to hurt their feelings), so surely God would help me.  I waited, and I waited, and I kept making the same old poor decisions and nothing changed in my friendship.

Jesus prayed in the garden from the depths of his heart, just as I was doing, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless…” (Matthew 26: 42)

And after reading this passage from the Bible, instead of just getting an emotional attachment to the idea of it in my head, I realized I had forgotten my “nevertheless.”  “Nevertheless,” Jesus prayed, “not as I will, but as You will.”  There was a way of escape; I knew it already—to stop being friends.  Now that doesn’t constitute being mean to anyone, but rather about not “hanging out” with this person so much and by speaking up about why I couldn’t do so anymore.  I had to have that hard conversation that I’d been avoiding all along.  That was my way of escape:  hard, not fun; but, not impossible!

Whatever your difficulty in life, whether it be alcoholism, drugs, television, internet, friendships, work, etc.; whatever it is that tempts you, I hope you remember your “nevertheless” in your prayers.  It helped me find the strength to do what I needed to do, and I know it can help you, too!  God bless you.

Tricia Reno