A Bucket of Crabs

I used to think if you were poor in America, it was because you wanted to be poor. America is a land of such unlimited opportunity, how could anyone remain poor unless they really just wanted to be that way? I’m not going to feel bad for people who have every opportunity to be different but decide to complain about their situation instead of doing something about it.

Over the past few years, though, I have seen situations up close that I never would have broken out of — such poverty and dysfunction and simple inability to do any better that simply surviving day to day constitutes real success. Sure, there are many who play the victim and don’t get any better because they’re not willing to do the work, but there are countless who truly, deeply need help.

What makes it even worse is Crab Bucket Syndrome — our human tendency not only to stay where we are (and how we are) but to work against anyone who tries to change. Sometimes it’s an active effort to drag people back down, but often it’s just your old life, and the people in it, working as an anchor, making escape such a constant struggle that you eventually give up and rejoin the rest of the crabs.

It’s no different in the church. Many see their experience of salvation not as the starting line — the beginning of a great contest in which our goal is to win the prize and where we train ourselves like an elite athlete — but as entry into the world’s greatest club with death benefits that are out of this world. For them, the church is Heaven’s waiting room, so they patiently wait their turn to die and enter into glory.

The rest begin to work out their faith with fear and trembling and make it some distance into the race, but at some point we all grow tired. We plateau. We decide, this is fine; I’m too exhausted to go further.

Our fellow crabs may not actively drag us back into the bucket, but they contribute to our exhaustion. People we look up to let us down. People who know better do us wrong. All of us crabs do it at some point. We’re all sinners, all working out our salvation. We fail each other constantly. It’s why the Bible doesn’t tell us to look to our fellow runners for support but to “keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith.” He is the only one who will never let us down.

Moving forward takes true dedication. When the other crabs try to pull us back, in whatever way, we have to determine not to let it happen and turn our focus instead to God and his Word. Our human nature would have us respond in one way; God leads us to something very different:

But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peace-loving, gentle, compliant, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without pretense. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who cultivate peace. – James 3:17-18

And:

Finally, all of you be like-minded and sympathetic, love one another, and be compassionate and humble, not paying back evil for evil or insult for insult but, on the contrary, giving a blessing, since you were called for this, so that you may inherit a blessing. – 1 Peter 3:8-9