Devotionals

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The Dynamite of Dependency

“Where are you going on holiday?” “Have you been away?” These are the questions that we all face from friends as the summer wears on and August beckons September. And in our minds we go back to the exciting times we’ve had on vacation; we relate the interesting things we saw and places we went. Rarely do we go into the humdrum of the stuff that takes up our daily time – the chores. Taking time off requires a lot of planning. There are tickets to book, money to pay, itineraries to make out and bags to pack. But that’s not what our friends are interested in hearing. It is however part and parcel of what makes a good holiday – good preparation. One of those tedious things I deplore doing is packing and unpacking. Before we can ever enjoy the relief of arriving and getting into the relaxation part, we are obliged to unpack. Then comes the crunch: what have we forgotten to pack? There’s always something! It’s usually small and of little consequence but with all the rushing about and last minute things to consider, it just gets left out.
It’s often like that in our Christian lives. On becoming a believer we enter into a new life, excited by the joys of being loved by the Lord and the privileges of being a part of the church and all the blessings of salvation. However we soon discover we’ve forgotten to pack some things in our spiritual suitcase that would make the journey so much more pleasurable. We look in our luggage and hope to get through with the bathing suit of a bright personality, the beach towel of a positive attitude and the summer clothes of a lot of good works. Even when we open the case wide and stand gazing intently, we fail to see that we have forgotten to pack that one essential item – a dependent spirit.
When Paul wrote to the Galatians, he was appalled that they were willing to start out with the Spirit and then go on by themselves. When Jesus invited the weary and those who were weighed down by the pressures of life, He also insisted that they were to take upon themselves His yoke. It was the apostle Peter who at the start of his second epistle, told the believers something that, if they unpacked it, could make their journey so much easier. God, he said, had already given them everything they needed to live a spiritual life that was pleasing to the Father. The fact is that we need to throw out the unnecessary junk of pride in our own ability and unpack the dynamite of dependency. When we do that we will embrace the true spirit of the Gospel and we will be able to enjoy the sights of grace.

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