Stuck On Myself

One thought that has stayed with me through the years is the idea that pride is not always self-elevating. My struggle is with the self-deprecating variety. It is most often evident in how I spend my time in prayer - I'm most often focused on myself: my brokenness, my need for God's transformation in my heart, my need to get my faith out of my head & mind and into my feet, hands, and mouth. These are good things. But all too often, I get no farther. I get "stuck" on myself.

This variety of pride doesn't really believe in God's all-surpassing sufficiency - in my life and in the world around me. This pride doesn't really believe in God's purpose and faithfulness to work in me as I move my life out of its comfortable box and in the direction of his nudging. This pride doesn't really believe that God's power is made perfect (and his glory shown) in my weakness, and that given history, I should expect his provision for me to do his work only after I get moving in his direction.

It's only in that posture of utter dependence that I should expect God to be able to fully bless me, and only for the purpose of being a blessing to others.

This (Super-)Natural Universe

In thinking about my absolute dependency on God's power, I often focus God as Creator. His power can be made very evident in relationships and in minor and major miracles, but our daily lives are much more affected by the world we live in. While among us we'll probably disagree about the exact mechanics of *how* God created it, bible-believing Christians all agree that he is the Source and Sustainer of this universe we inhabit. And in my better moments, I marvel at the almost literally incredible wonder of it; the natural seems to me supernatural.

I am physically a bundle of 64 billion billion billion sub-atomic particles, spinning around each other, bonding in groups, very precisely arranged, in such a way as to make a living breathing being that can move, think, dream, and act as a vessel of that intangible, immortal, supernatural thing we call a soul. Incredible.

Power

I don't know about you, but I don't want to come to the end of myself. The idea flies in the face of all conventional wisdom, and against every fiber of my self-protecting and loved-one-protecting nature. Yet, as David Platt puts it: "This is how God works. He puts his people in positions where they are desperate for his power, and then he shows his provision in says that display his greatness." He used God's defeat of Jericho through Joshua as a reference, and he didn't even mention the top-notch military training program God used a preparation: circumcision. Yeah, that sounds like great preparation for an attack on the enemy. God's ways are certainly not our ways - his power loves those who hate and dies to live.

Which leads me to question: Do I really want more of God's power in my life?

Or do I just want God to give me more power?