Help Me

When it comes to what we call “Salvation” there is both the Helper and the helpless.  When your ship is sinking in shark infested waters you need help. Problem with most of us is we thought our Titanic was unsinkable. The Syrophoenician  woman sought help from Jesus.  “Lord, help me,” she pleaded.  Another needy woman with the issue of blood, found no one was able to help her.  She had exhausted all her resources to no avail.  At last, faith reached out to grace and touched the hem of Christ’s garment.  She felt it and Jesus felt it.  No one else was aware that something had happened. Power (virtue) went out of one and entered into the other. “For by Grace are you saved through faith.” That is the way it is with Salvation.

In another case study, a man with an infirmity lay for thirty-eight years by the Pool of Bethesda. Then Jesus came by.  He engaged the man asking if he wanted to be made whole.  “I have no one to help me (my paraphrase).”  Note two important elements of this story.  One, faith lay at the foot of Grace and the man was helpless. It was every cripple for himself in this dog eat dog world. He was helpless.  Being helpless does not mean you are hopeless. Notice he was an “impotent” man, not an “important man”.  There is a difference. Everyone is willing to help an important man.  People want to get an “important” man’s autograph or to sign their Bible. They want to pay for his lunch, put him on their board of directors, drop his name in a conversation.  Not so with the “unimportant” (so called) people. An “impotent man” is helpless. 
When we realize that we are helpless, then we suddenly are at the feet of Grace.  It is at that point God asks “would you be made whole?” If faith will look up Jesus and see Him as the only Savior, then, “by Grace are you can be saved through faith.”  Impotence is lifted up by omnipotence.  God gives grace to the humble.

In the fourteenth chapter of John Jesus promised that the “Comforter” will come.  The word Paraclete means “Helper,” One called to the side or aid of another.  God is our Help.  Salvation is God’s response to the prayer (or cry) of man’s greatest need which is to be cleansed from sin and set right with God.  
Once we think we are somebody “important” we place a wall between ourselves and grace. This is not to say man has no responsibility or part in salvation.  No one will ever go to heaven who doesn’t want to.  Everyone ever saved came to the place where they realized that God does not need our help, only our heart.  Bible salvation is the humble heart of faith allowing Grace to work unhindered. Then because of the help and power of God (Grace) it can say “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” The helped never forgets, it is not the finger that touches the hem, but the heart that believes in Him that is the secret of salvation. That’s not impotent, but important.  Salvation is God’s response to the sinner’s SOS.  If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thy heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Every believer can say with the Apostle Paul (even if in chains) “Having obtained help from God, I continue to this day.” -id