Dependence upon God

I am reading now book Empowered living and I wanted to share some interesting thoughts that I found for myself.

We may never fully understand why God asks of us some of the things He does or why He allows certain problems and trials. We can, however, depend upon Him as loving father and trust His judgement and wisdom. We dont have to know the reason. We only have to practise belief in His guidance, surrender to His will - even when the way seems rough, even when His choice for us is the last thing we may want to do - and put our full dependence on Him to solve the problems with whish we are beset.

Everyone who has ever tried to live the Christian life has encountered firsthand that dependence, as an intellectual truth, is a far easier thing to assent to than the exercise of dependence as a living, breathing reality during crisis. Many people ask God's help as they muddle through life's problems, but this is not dependence. If the truth is told, most of us have seldom experienced dependence upon God. I say (book writer) that because with untold millions professing Christianity, we have less power than the twelve disciples did. Had we learned the secret of dependence, we would not find ourselves so helpless.

The transition from the old self-directed life to the Spirit-directed life is never easy, but this is not because God in some arbitrary way has chosen to make the way difficult. It is because our own heartfelt desire for self-government and the clamoring of our appetites, passions, and desires that the Christian yoke seems so onerous. Unless we choose to fully let go of such things to the control of a wise Father, we may find our attempts to live the Christian life a miserable existence. Our minds will intellectually desire to go forward in the path of God, while every other fiber of our being is straining to return to the old life.

It is what we pine for that truly shows where our affections are. Unless those affections are decisively removed from the worldly and placed upon heavenly, our spiritual life will resemble a yo-yo, always moving up and down, but never moving beyond the ties that bind us to the hand of Satan. It is never easy to escape his bounds, for when we desire rescue and are willing to be dependent, he is aroused to resist us. Satan welcomes any religious practise that allows self to live, for in ourselves we are powerless, but should we start to depend upon God moving forward as He opens the way, then he is a defeated foe and knows he must lose the conflict.