God’s
Power comes when mine comes to an end,
So,
there’s no need at all for the ‘me’ to contend,
Trust
is ever simple—just surrender, it’s true,
It’s the only way ever
that God’s Power will renew.
***
There is the regular
reminder for all of us, I’m sure—a reminder that occurred for me recently when
I insisted upon the use of my own pathetic strength—which is true pitiful and
proud weakness—that great power vanishes when it’s no longer required.
God’s Spirit leaves the
state and the country so far as we’re personally concerned.
Of course, God’s Spirit
never leaves from anywhere. It’s always here. But as we quench the Living
Spirit in us, that selfsame Spirit, the Person of the Living God in us, turns
his face. God cannot abide with us as we venture hand-in-hand with the sin of
pride; that we might forge our own self-willed way.
The magnificent heights of
my pride were found in the breath of another’s prayer for me; that I would do
things no longer in my own strength, but in God’s strength alone. Whoa, that
was too much. Those sorts of things are always too much for our pride that
regales upon the backlash that it’s not the ‘king of the moment’.
Pride always compels us to
be kings and queens of the moment.
Unchecked pride soon
designs and constructs the sort of searing anger that we don’t know where it came from. The enemy of God loves
to confuse us. Dazed in an emotional lapse of quite monumental proportions, I leapt
out of where I was quietly ‘controlling’ myself. Yep, pride.
***
The greatness of God in
all this is he soon brightens the soul with an opportunity at perspective. It’s a glimmer and a
glance—that’s all—a little foretaste—to see if we’ll come around.
The goodness of God is his
grace in this situation. Who would be so routinely betrayed, yet forgive so
gracefully? Only the Living Lord our God.
In the perspective of his
greatness and goodness the Lord reminds us of how to access his joy, his peace,
and to bear the fruit of repentance.
It is at the end of our
strength—when we finally give our game away—that we gain insight for the repealing
power in grace; we discern what now appears so simple, but for the very life of
us seemed to confound us in that irredeemable anger of ours.
***
Strength and power are as obvious as
they are simple—once we find them. Modes of surrender, humility and repentance
redeem this power for us, which helps us in our weakness. Such ‘weak’ people that
rely on their Lord as fully as they can have more power than the powerful
pretend to have.
© 2013 S. J. Wickham.
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