Exhaustion and frustration have a way of blowing away the fog, revealing what’s really happening inside of us. We discover where we really find our strength not when we feel strong, but when we feel weak.
Do you lean on God for all that you need, or have you made His help, His strength, and His guidance a kind of last resort? Many of us are more self-reliant than we would admit, and self-reliance is far more dangerous than it sounds.
A common delusion, is that we can do anything if we are willing to work hard. We are stronger than we think, strong enough to do anything we want to do in the world. The reality, however, is that the vast majority of us are weaker than we realize and yet love to think ourselves strong. And a false sense of strength not only intensive our arrogance and our ineffectiveness but it also offends God.
By nature, we are not trusting creatures. We are creatures of necessity. We trust God when we are forced to trust Him because our problems go beyond our abilities. The rest of the time, we get along just fine by ourselves. If we can solve the problem by ourselves, we don’t resort to prayer or trusting God because we don’t need to trust Him. It’s only when we come to the end of ourselves and cast ourselves in total dependence on God that we begin to experience genuine praise and thanksgiving.
Our delight is often in the strength of our legs -our work ethic, our perseverance, our cleverness, our strategies. And that temptation touches every part of our life because every part of life in a fallen world requires strength. But God is not pleased by all that we can do -unless we do all that we do in His strength and not our own.
We do rely on ourselves. We slip into habits of living, and working, that didn’t require Him, and sometimes barely even acknowledge Him.
Jeremiah 17:5 warning is sobering,
The Lord says, “Cursed is the man who trusts in man, relies on strength of flesh, and who’s heart departs from the Lord.”
The person who deep down trusts in himself cannot help but slowly walk away from God.
We fight self-sufficiently by glorifying all that God can do, and we fight by learning to embrace just how little we can do apart from Him. John 15:5 says “Whoever abides in Me and I in Him, bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.”
Many can record this verse and yet still quietly suspect that He’s really exaggerating. We know we can do something on our own. And if we wint admit it, our prayer lives will betray us.
The humble are strong because they know how weak they truly are -and how strong Good will be for them. They say,
“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” – Psalm 73:26.
The humble experience what Isaiah promised in Isaiah 40:29-31,
“He gives power to the faint, and to him who had no might he increases strength… They who wait for the Lotd shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings likes eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.“
By embracing their weakness, the find great reservoirs of strength, strength enough to run and then fly.
The Apostle Paul knew how weak he was and where to find true strength. When he was pleaded with God to remove the thorn in his flesh that plagued him, God said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Why would God, in infinite, fatherly love for Paul, not share him the pain and inconvenience of this weakness? Because our weakness welcomes the gracious strength and intervention of God.
Weakness welcomes grace. When we feel strong, we are not prone to rely on the grace and strength of God. We begin to experience, and even enjoy the delusion that we are strong. We forget God and our need for Him. But when we feel our weakness, we more fully experience reality and we remember our tremendous, continual need for Him. The intensity of our pain (or thorn in our flesh) unearths the depths of His grace and mercy. Without them, we would only play in the wading pool of grace, instead of exploring the endless storehouses God filled and kept for us.
God alone makes peace (Psalm 147:14). We cannot achieve real peace in families or friendships, in a church, or a nation, unless God quiets the conflict and awakes harmony. If we think we can achieve peace without God, we do not understand peace, or God.
“Great is our Lord, and abundant in power, His understanding is beyond measure“ – Psalm 147:5
Our power is small and often failing, but His power is abundant and never exhausted. Our understanding is extremely limited and often flawed, but His understanding is universal ns inevitable. Why would we ever rely on ourselves?
We often learn to rely on our own strength because we want the recognition and respect of others. We want to become known as strong, not weak. As independent not dependent. As self-sufficient not needy. We want to be the achievers and creators, the healers and the heroes.
If we think of ourselves or others as achievers, creators, reformers, innovators, movers, and shakes, healed, educators, and benefactors of society in any way at all, we are at the deepest level of kidding ourselves. We have nothing and never had anything that we gave not received, nor have we done anything good apart from God who did it through us.
J.I. Packer
The happiest, strongest, most meaningful productive have embraced, and rejoiced, in that reality. We have done nothing good apart from God who did it through us.
“Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on a pilgrimage” – Psalm 84:5
From Pity to Praise 