T. D. Jakes - Help Me, Ive Fallen and I Cant Get Up!

A popular television commercial for a medical alert device featured an elderly woman who cried out, Help! Ive fallen, and I cant get up!

The woman wanted to get up but couldnt. Lacking the strength to get back on her feet, she needed help.

As Christians, we all fall from time to time. Life knocks us off balance, lays us low, and renders us weak and incapacitated through no fault of our own. Something inside of us wants to stand, but we dont have the mobility or freedom to act on what we have decided to do.

The cause of the fall is not as important as what we do while we are down. Like the woman in the commercial, we must put aside fear, pride, or embarrassment and learn not only how to ask for help but Whom to ask. After all, help is just a breath away.

What Comes Before a Fall?

P ride comes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall (Proverbs 16:18).

Pride comes before a fall. But what is pride? Pride is defined as being high-minded; showing ones self above others. Another definition states: Pride is a conceited sense of ones superiority. Pride has caused the fall of many great and gifted individuals.

Pride has caused the fall of many great and gifted individuals.

The first known instance of pride occurred before the creation of the earth. Lucifer, the head angel in charge of praise, decided he was going to be greater than God Himself.

How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into Heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides farthest of the north. I will be like the most High (Isaiah 14:12-14).

Driven by self-deception, prideful self-delusion, and self-importance, Lucifer considered himself better than God. This explains why most of his statements begin with the word I.

Lucifer, whose name at one time meant light-bearer, was cast down by God to earth, where he would be known as satan. No longer a praise leader or a majestic angel, instead he became one who roams to and fro on the earth like a lion looking for someone to devour.

Satans pride led to his downfall. Pride and selfishness go hand in hand. Usually where there is pride, there is also the prevailing spirit of selfishness. Selfishness is defined as loving ones self first.

Satan thought he could be better than God Himself. Of course he was wrong. satan was deceived. How he even conceived such a thought is beyond imagination. But pride blinds us to the truth and prevents the proud from viewing life realistically.

Pride blinds us to the truth and prevents the proud from viewing life realistically.

As we know, satan has never repented. Instead, he tries to deceive as many of Gods children as possible and drag them down to share in his dreadful fallen state.

The prophet Daniel records the downfall of the great Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. One day, the king looked around at all he had accomplished and arrogantly stated: Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty? (Daniel 4:30).

While he was still speaking these arrogant words, a voice from Heaven said, O King Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee (vs. 31). That same hour, the once-great king lost his mind and began to act like an animal, eating grass until his hairs were grown like eagles feathers, and his nails like birds claws (vs. 33).