To Encourage You

2 Corinthians 1:8-9 “For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.”

John 15:5 “Apart from me you can do nothing.”

One of the things we hear so much today is the admonition that “You can do it!”  We are told that we need to have self-confidence!  We need to be assertive!  And, of course, a lack of self-confidence can paralyze a person in fear. A lack of self-confidence can keep us from ever taking a risk.  So, we do things that help build confidence. We get an education. We train. We work hard.  Surely, no one wants a surgeon operating on them who has no confidence in his or her own ability to correct a problem that only surgery can correct.  No one wants someone working on their car who has no confidence that they can fix whatever isn’t working.  But there’s a fine line in all of this, especially when we extend the confidence in our abilities into the spiritual realm. 

You see, in the spiritual realm we aren’t dealing with nuts and bolts. We aren’t dealing with things that we can just read and learn about from a text book.  No, we are dealing with powerful unseen forces that are set against the kingdom of God.  We are working in a realm that is affected by the great power of “he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).  We are wrestling not with things we can see, “but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12).  So, if we think we can do the work of the Kingdom of God in our own strength and abilities, we are fooling ourselves, for God has told us plainly “without me, you can do nothing.” 

So do we really believe this?  Apparently, we don’t, at least not very well.  Even the apostle Paul, who had seen the glorified Christ with his own eyes and who had been taught personally by Jesus in his preparation for ministry, had to be trained, through the struggles he endured, to not rely on himself but on God.  In order to be used mightily by God, as indeed he was, he had to first be taken to the point in his Christian walk where he was burdened beyond his own strength. He had to be brought to the point that he saw his great need for God’s power in his life. He had to learn and believe these words from God Himself as he struggled against his own “thorn in the flesh”: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). It was only then that Paul would come to rely not on his own abilities and self-confidence, but on God, the only One Who is “greater than he that is in the world.”  It was only then that he could say “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”  It’s because of this attitude that Paul would plead with the Corinthians, “You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many” (2 Corinthians 1:11). 

You see, a self-confident Christian is likely to be a prayerless Christian. People who pride themselves on their intellect, including their knowledge of the Word of God, will be rendered ineffective in ministry if it’s in that knowledge that they trust.  As we are taught in 1 Corinthians 13 “knowledge puffs up” while “love builds up.”  But love, i.e., God’s love, will only be expressed through our lives through total dependence upon God to quash our proud self-confidence and replace it with a humble, submissive reliance and dependence on the work of God’s grace in our lives. 

Sadly, our pride is often so deep-seated that it is only by way of trial, only by being “burdened beyond our own strength,” that we can come to the place of truly relying “not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.”  But that’s where God would have us in order for us to be truly useful to Him in His efforts to work through us to bring others into the kingdom of God. 

May God help us to realize the absolute truth of Jesus’ words, that “Apart from me you can do nothing,” nothing, that is, that will advance the kingdom of God.  You see, it is not you and I that are greater than “he that is in the world.” No, it is only the One who is in you that is greater than he that is in the world (1 John 4:4), and the One Who is in us can only do His great work as we learn to “rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.”  But thanks be to God, there is no greater power in all the world than that.