"Desperate to hit ROCK Bottom"

In response to my "Fear of Weakness" post (below - March 20), my brother in the Lord Dave Sutherland emailed the following to me today with the subject line "Desperate to hit ROCK Bottom." I thought I would post an excerpt here to edify those who read this blog. It is worth thinking about:

First, although the weaknesses revealed were very personal to you, there is a lot there that all of us have to grapple with.

Secondly, the many layers of self-garbage that you mentioned have given me a new understanding of a special scripture.

"Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord' and do not do what I say? I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built." - Luke 6:46-48

What really struck me is that the man, in wanting to build his house on the rock, first "dug down deep". I think the message that is standing out to me now is that in order to be someone who really listens to Christ and really does what He says, we have to first dig and dig and dig through the shifting sands of our many levels of perversity. If we don't first dig to find Christ, then the whole basis of our lives and speech and ministry is self-garbage. And your realizations seemed to me to be that type of digging that Christ requires of His followers. To identify and move to the side everything that is not Him so that when we lay our foundation it is on Him and not our our illusions regarding self.

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Discipleship isn't just a building process, it's a digging down process first. In this way, you don't have to fear that you are moving backwards when you are realizing problems. You are in a digging phase. You will uncover the reality of Christ and find a sweet foundation on which to build.