Death by a thousand cuts

I had a great chat with a good friend over coffee this morning. We were talking about how learning the truth in life and growing into the shape God would have us take up is more often than not such a slow and painful process. The reason for this is related to my last post.

Growing up is actually growing down! That is to say that maturity is about 'learning how to die' (see Jon Foreman's song of this title). But dying necessarily takes a long time. God could do it in one knock-out punch; he could knock us off our feet. But the trouble is that if He did it in one we would never get up off the canvas. Or to switch the metaphor, if He cut the mess out of us with one incision we would die of blood loss.

So we endure the death of a thousand cuts, which is to say He does his work slowly and surely. This is his mercy, although it does not feel much like it at the time. It feels more like a long, drawn out death, which is just what it is. It is actually for our good that it happens in this way.

What is our role? To pray for endurance I suppose, that we would stay on the operating table long enough for the work to be completed.