In truth I have no idea what I don’t know because I haven’t yet learned it.
Is it possible to deny Christ with our actions and not just our lips? I believe it is.
However, I don’t think there is safety in constructing more rules in the effort to keep myself “safe.”
If I were to say to myself that there is a rule about people who strive for God—that striving is either invalid or not allowed—then I would sink into inaction and laziness. If I were to say that those who are called cannot own anything and still be true disciples, I would sink into asceticism, thereby demonstrating that I do not know Him. If I were to declare that the gospel requires monastic isolation to be valid in the believer, it would never touch down in the relationships God has sown into my life, making the gospel of no effect and dead. If I said that only those who achieve great things for God could ever bring Him glory, I would bar the door against the least of these, who are the greatest in the Kingdom.
The same is true for many things we would call dutiful and noble but that in the end cannot glorify anyone but us.
Only God knows what He would have us actually do in any given moment. The miracle is that He reveals His will to us, not just in His word but through His people and, most importantly, by the living power of Himself, alive in us. In fact, the only way to know how to guide is to know the Guide and allow Him to do His work, not just out there but in here.
I cannot know which way to go and what to do unless I am indwelt by the Holy Spirit and sensitive and obedient to His leading.
He may call my brother in season to sell all that he has and give to the poor, and that is how he must follow then. He may call me in season to live in houses I did not build and draw from wells I did not dig, and I must humble myself and follow or fall into disobedience. He may call another in season to tear down enemy strongholds and burn everything they stood for as a sacrifice to Him, and if that one does not follow victory through to the end, he fails. He may call still another in season to stand against numberless millions of demonic opportunists with nothing greater than faith, and if that one does not rise to the occasion, victory is lost. And He may call yet another in season to build something magnificent and immense by faith, not for his own benefit but for those who will rise afterward, and if that one refuses to build, the thing will never exist.
These disobediences cost the blood of God.
Even my best efforts require the grace Jesus bought with His blood.
If I do not do when I know what should do, I disobey.
If I do not know what to do yet, it is best to wait until I am certain, because I could, by doing what I am able to do (or even gifted at doing) within the limits of my own capacity, undo a great deal of that which God would have me receive by humble, honest acknowledgment that His works are everlasting, not mine. I must not, however, employ waiting as a tactic against working. I must not pretend ignorance when God has made it clear what I ought to do but I would rather persist in being inactive because I am afraid or unwilling.
Sometimes the doing is all God, and all we must do is believe and receive.
Instead, many times we run simply to run, to feel like we’re contributing something. We do this because that is what is expected or because we aren’t quite able to let go of the working of our works.
Would we really build whole empires on the sands of what we are able to accomplish, or would we defer to what God is able to do? If so, total surrender will be absolutely required—not only in regard to what work is done but also how and when.
What does it look like to influence the influencers? Is it a thing that can only be achieved under lights on stages by great movements, or is it a happening that is easily overlooked, humble, even forgettable? I propose that it can be both, and further, that it is not limited to either.
Did I come to Christ to dictate terms for how He should use me, or did I come honestly, ready to lay it all down, eager to make Him my great reward?
I must come to the place at last where I strip off all my expectations and limitations and release Him from all obligation to my version of what my life ought to look like. My version of success must go. My goals and dreams must die, even if they are never to be resurrected. My comforts and wishes must be transformed into that which is God-glorifying and God-edifying.
Only when I have been brought to total, unconditional surrender will God’s dream for my life really begin to be fulfilled.
Only then will the peace that passes understanding become manifest (and that peace is a guardian, a warrior—not pacifistic but strong and immovable and serious).
Until these blessings are manifest in my life, I am wandering in the desert, always and above all else trying to understand “why” about everything I am made to suffer. But when I am brought into that intimate place where I finally give all, I will know that it is not I who achieve or work or do or take down, but God.