Being “OK” with Not Being “OK”

By the grace of God I am what I am (I Corinthians 15:10).

You just want to be OK. Your struggles are constant; your conflicts are continuous; your battles are endless. You just look forward to that plane – that place and time in life – where everything will just finally be OK.

Really though, who in this life is truly “OK”? The simple fact of the matter is that, regardless of what outward appearances may suggest, we are all weak, frail, flawed and endlessly faltering creatures – all of us, without exception. The entire creation – every last bit of it – has been subjected, against their will, to vanity. None can escape it; not even you.

For the creature was made subject[1] to vanity,[2] not willingly, but by reason of Him Who has subjected the same in hope (Romans 8:20).

This all will be gloriously and permanently corrected in the resurrection, but you might as well go ahead and admit i: for now you’re broke, and you aren’t going to be “fixed” for now. Granted, you may have some days that are better than others, some circumstances that seem to indicate that you are “OK,” but the wearisome cycle will simply reoccur.

Thus it is by design – by divine design – and Father is bringing you to a place where you are OK with not being OK, a place where you simply rest in His current purpose and plan in your training and development for that grand and magnificent culmination that He has also wonderfully and skillfully designed especially for you – in your next life.

The Christian “Fix”

Christianity always wants to “fix” everything. Religious bookstores are found to abound in “How to …” books. Pulpiteers continually weary their benched-flocks with what they must do to correct things. The pressure is constantly on to get it all corrected, focusing on the problems, on the circumstances, on changing everything – on deliverance from what makes us not OK. Please don’t be influenced to buy into this illusive dream.

Though you may have recurring periods of better circumstances and better performances, that which ultimately stops you from being truly OK will never change. The root of your real problem is not coming from your varied and fluctuating circumstances; they are actually coming from the design of God found in you – the failure to which He has subjected you. He has purposefully and expertly created you with flaws – an abundance of them – that will never go away in this lifetime.

Count on it: if God Himself, in His great wisdom and love for you, has – at this time – subjected you to futility, all of the self-help-religion in the world won’t be able to change it.

The Real Answer

Because of this wise and competent plan of Father, the real answer is never to be found in you at all. The answer is to be found in Him – and in Him alone. It is to be found in knowing just Who He really is, and just what His plans are for you in this temporal life.

[God] said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you: for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest on me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities … for when I am weak, then am I strong (II Corinthians 12:9-10).

I Am What I Am

By the grace of God I am what I am (I Corinthians 15:10).

“I am what I am.” Herein lays a great key. God has made you what you are. You are His handiwork[3] – every bit of you – flaws and all. You are what you are by God’s direct hand. Rest in Him. Rest in His work in you. Rest in His plan for you. Rest in His sure outcome for you.

As a son of God we can be thankful for the sufferings and hardships of this life. If not for them, we would be distracted from our celestial hope. In a seemingly strange, yet divine way, we can even be thankful for our bouts with complaining, realizing that they, too, are a God-send. After all, “all things are of God” (II Corinthians 5:18), even the “evil spirit from the LORD” that troubled Saul (I Samuel 16:14). For, even for us, our complaining makes us realize that this world is not our home and creates in us such a strong desire for something more, something better – and that better thing is Father Himself!

So, relax; the way you are is His outworking in you.

Being OK with Others Not Being OK

It’s the same for other people as well: they are who they are. We are all in His skillful hands; each one of us designed and being masterfully crafted to fit into His glorious, creative collage.

Just as it is true that we are the way we are because Father is working in us, even so He is working His expert plan perfectly and precisely in all of His creation, as He is the “faithful Creator” (I Peter 4:19).

Father is extremely good at His job, and just like with any other work, you can’t judge the finished product when seeing it in some stage of its development. This is true of you and me, but it is also true of our loved ones and friends – all of God’s creation!

Attempting to be “God” to someone is an especially hard job if you are not qualified. There is only One in the universe qualified for such a daunting task, and He already has all things squarely under His control.

Don’t be discouraged when you look around you. What you see is not the end of God’s plan and purpose. What you see is not the finished product of God. God is actively at work in us in every circumstance, of every life. He is steadily and successfully working “all things after the counsel of His Own will,” finding no challenge with the circumstances and lives of our loved ones – not even the hard cases. Nothing poses an obstacle to Him – after all, He is the Almighty God.

Don’t be overwhelmed: you’re not the Workman. God is God; He is in charge. He loves others just as unconditionally as He loves you. He is molding them as surely as He is you – day-by-day – into all that He intends for them to be, regardless of what we may think we currently see.

One day you’ll be OK. In the resurrection Father will perfect His work in you. Until then you can be OK with not being OK. It’s all Father’s plan. To Him, beautiful is the mess we are.

So, relax and enjoy His work.

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.

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[1] “Made subject” is translated “placed under” in the Emphatic Diaglot.

[2] The Greek word translated “vanity” here is mataiotēs, and is defined by Joseph Thayer (Thayer’s Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament) as: “What is devoid of truth and appropriateness; perverseness, depravity, frailty, want [i.e., lack] of vigor.” B.W. Johnson (People’s New Testament) defines it as “seeking without finding.” It is translated in the follow ways by various versions:

“aimless frustration” (An Understandable Version)
“spoiled” (Bible in Worldwide English)
“frustrated” (Goodspeed New Testament)
“imperfection” (Montgomery New Testament)
“folly” (The Riverside New Testament)
“failure and unreality”(Weymouth New Testament)
“futile”(Moffatt New Testament)
“weak” (New Life Study Testament)
“imperfection” (Centenary Translation)
“dissolution” (Original New Testament)

[3] “We are His workmanship” (Ephesians 2:10, KJV).

“His achievement are we” (CLT).
“we are His handiwork” (Weymouth).

The Spirit of God Sabotages Our Intentions

For the flesh is lusting against the spirit, yet the spirit against the flesh. Now these are opposing one another, lest you should be doing whatever you may want (Galatians 5:17).

We almost always make this verse say that the spirit keeps us from doing all of the bad things we want to do.

This is true; but it also keeps us from doing all the good things.

The key phrase of this passage is:

… lest you should be doing whatever you may want.

What do we want to do? Two things: fleshly things and good things. Yet, if we could make a wish, we would want to do good continually. Oh, wouldn’t we be saintly and spectacular.

A desire to be perfect is also a lust of the flesh. It is in our best interests to be kept weak. II Corinthians 4:7 explains:

Now we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the transcendence of the power may be of God and not of us. God keeps us weak so that we might constantly acclaim His power and not our own.

Remarkably, the same spirit that incites us to good works also keeps us from becoming moral super-people.

Can you learn to thank God for this, even when you are yet again failing Him?

You cannot do everything you want to do. You would like to be a better parent, a better employee, a better friend. It would help if you could make more money. You want to pay your bills, but you can’t find a job.

You wanted to get a good night’s sleep last night, but worry kept you up. Money vexes your life. It seems to be a measure of your success and failure. You try to save it, but you can’t. There is always another expense – always. Someone always needs something. What about your needs? They burn on the altar of sacrifice – again.

Still, there is more. Someone needed you yesterday, and you failed them. Today, you yelled at your children. The debilitating fatigue and accompanying impatience hit you in the late afternoon, after your son and daughter arrived home from school. You love them more than life itself; you would die for them. The last thing you want is to lose your temper at them. At 4:50 p.m., in the kitchen, it is the first thing you do. My God, what comes over you?

Later, you cry.

Each day is a struggle. … It is because we are bound. It is because God has limited us – horribly limited us. He has made it so that we cannot do what we want. He has sabotaged our vessels so that we cannot be the people we want to be. How we try. It is noble to try. We all try, and should. We pick up our burdens and try to budge them. Sometimes, we succeed. A miracle happens, and we are good people. Whenever this happens, we praise our Father. We ought to, because a dozen failures are coming down the pike.

I do not write from a place of depression or paranoia, but from reality and truth. I know so much about the love and sovereignty of God. He sustains the lilies of the field, and yet cares for me exceedingly more. What happens next? I promptly forget it. I forget about His care. Every day – at least sometime during the day, I doubt Him. Every day, I fail. Then comes an entire day when I lay utter confidence at His feet. His love remains constant throughout, but still …

Oh, that we could relax and even glory in our bonds, knowing that these limitations are of divine origin, and that they must precede liberation. We cannot know the sweet, coming release, apart from our writhing within these confines. There is meaning in sweet writhing. May we both strain and relax in our splendid disability.

Martin Zender
Clanging Gong News
Volume 3, Issue 6

Tailor-Made Trials

All is of God (Romans 11:36).

The steps of a man are ordered by the LORD (Psalms 37:23).

All things work together for good to them who love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).

So, you’re in a rough spot. No worries, it is a placed designed for you especially by God. Your trial has been tailor-made just for you by the loving hands of your Father. He knows exactly what you need to bring you to the next place in your growth and life. After all, it is He Who has been steadily working on you since day one. For you are “His workmanship,” “His achievement” (Ephesians 2:10); and what He has started He will faithfully finish. We are, therefore,

Confident of this very thing, that He Who has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6).

What a place of rest that faith brings us to. We are exactly where God wants us to be – always have been, always will be. The trial that you are now in has been carefully tailor-made for you. God is continuing the steady development of His molding of your life. He is smart, really smart; He knows exactly what He is doing; He always has, He always will. He also knows exactly what you need at this moment in your life – way more than what you think you need. This trial that you endure, as hard as it may appear to be, is not an accident; it is not a mistake; it is not some foreign intrusion into your heart and soul to do you harm, for which Father must deliver you. No, this trial is His master-work specifically designed to meet your needs. You are His “good work” and He is skillfully employing “all things” – the “good” as well as the “evil” – to bring about His grand purpose in you, resulting in a glorious finish.

Relax. Rest. Thank Him for His wisdom in placing you in this tailor-made trial. Revel in His all-encompassing, never-failing love and care of you. Remember that Father knows best.

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
© Daily Email Goodies™

Suffering: God’s Forgotten Gift

A book by:

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.

Two gifts given to the believer are mentioned by Paul in Philippians 1:29.

The first is “to believe on Him.” This is a glorious gift. Every believer has been given this gift from God. Those who possess it may not even fully recognize it as a gift from Him; but, indeed, faith is God’s wonderful gift to us. Faith is a rich gift from God, yet there is also another gift from God to the believer mentioned by Paul in Philippians 1:29 that is equally as glorious.

The second gift is “also to suffer for His sake.” This, too, is a glorious gift. Every believer has been given this gift from God as well, but those who possess it often do not fully recognize it for what it is. Indeed, suffering for His sake similarly is God’s wonderful gift to us. Paul teaches us to embrace this second gift as well as we do the first!

ISBN: 9781934251584

http://www.pilkingtonandsons.com/clp.htm

Morning and Evening

Vanity of vanities; all is vanity … I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity … (Ecclesiastes 1:2, 14).

Life is vain when viewed apart from the Sovereign, loving God who is our Father.

I feel for those who face daily life apart from the knowledge that He is in complete control.

My days, all of them were written in Your book; the days, they were formed when there was not one of them (Psalms 139:16).

The steps of a man are ordered by the LORD (Psalms 37:23).

Think of these wonderful truths. All your days written in God’s book, formed there before any of them ever had been lived. Many live their daily lives without recognition of the stabilizing truth of the One Who “works all things after the counsel of His Own will” (Ephesians 1:11). They approach their day, and struggle through it, as the master of their own lives.

For those who live as though they were in charge of their lives, two of the hardest parts of the day are waking up in the morning and going to bed in the evening.

In the mornings, days are greeted with uncertainty as thoughts of the “What if …” trials and challenges of the day press in upon the mind and heart. There is a waking up to varying degrees of uneasiness, concern, apprehension, worry and anxiety; even at times to overwhelming fear, dread and depression. Feelings of inadequacy and uncertainty press in.

In the evenings, days are retired with the annoying “What if …” reflections of its happenings. There is second guessing, regret and disappointment. Feelings of frustration, disappointment and failure settle in; even at times shame, guilt and worthlessness.

After all, they see themselves as the lords of their own lives, the captains of their own ships and the masters of their own destiny. With this view comes but a recurring cycle of vanity.

Vanity of vanities; all is vanity … What profit has a man of all his labor which he takes under the sun? One generation passes away, and another generation comes: but the earth abides. The sun also arises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to his place where he arose … All things are full of labor; man cannot express it: the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing (Ecclesiastes 1:2-8).

Why is man’s life filled with such vanity; such futility, emptiness, barrenness, purposelessness and aimless frustration? Because he has been subjected so by his Creator.

For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him Who has subjected the same in hope (Romans 8:20).

“Vanity” is the lot of man “under the sun.” Yet for the believer who has been seated in the celestials, quite another view prevails! Instead of being bound to vanity, we can rise to heights of divine life.

Solomon’s perspective “under the sun” showed the vanity of the human viewpoint. Paul’s perspective, “far above all heavens” revealed true purpose found only in the divine viewpoint: “your labor is not in vain in the Lord” (I Corinthians 15:58).

Those of us who know Father as the great Planner and Director of our days have a completely different approach to our mornings and evenings – and the entire unfolding of our every minute of our day.

In the mornings, days can be greeted with the joy and excitement of knowing that they are His, as well as ourselves. The uncertainties of the “What if …” viewpoint are divinely transformed into the eager anticipation of seeing what God has planned for the day. We are able to awaken to the thrill of knowing that we will be witnesses of the unfolding of His detailed plan and purpose for our day. His presence presses in upon our minds. There is a waking up to peace and joy as we know that our life, with all of its daily circumstances, is firmly in His hand, and carried out by His capable direction. Our hearts are able to say, “Today we are on the great adventure of faith!”

In the evenings, when the day is over, we can rest our heads on our pillows and with surety and confidence regarding our day say, “This was the will of God.” The “What if …” reflections of its happenings are transformed into a place of peace and rest – knowing that the will of God was done, and who could have prevented it? The realization of our divine appointment is able to settle within our hearts and minds. After all, He is the Lords of our life, the Captain of our ship, the Master our destiny.

He does according to His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand (Daniel 4:35).

We have the joy of waking up each morning as His clay.
We have the anticipation of living each day as His workmanship.
We have the rest of laying our heads on our pillow each night as His achievement.

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
© Bible Student’s Notebook^™

Adversarial Strongholds

For the weapons of our warfare are not physical, but powerful through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to Christ’s obedience (II Corinthians 10:4).

Lately I have been wanting to quit. I’ve considered throwing in the towel.

Well, that may be a little misleading. What’s misleading is the “lately” part. Truth is, this feeling of wanting to give up is actually quite reoccurring. What I am trying to say is that “lately” it has been trying to fill my thoughts again.

Are you struggling with God’s will in your life? Has the enemy somehow convinced you that Father does not really know what is best for you? That somehow your life is a mess, and that you are just barely hanging on. That somewhere there is a better plan for your life than the one that He is actually carrying out? That somehow, when it comes to your daily life, you are managing to doubt His vast wisdom, His unfailing love, and His boundless goodness? If so, you are not alone.

These strongholds are real, and we face them – to one degree or another – daily. They are satanic strongholds that actually battle against the very nature of God, exalting itself against His wise, loving and good plan for our lives. They oppose the life of God in us, attempting to prevent us from enjoying all that God has for us, keeping our minds in confusion and in bondage to fear, frustration, disappointment and discouragement.

Yet, just what is it about which are we actually fearful, frustrated, disappointed and discouraged?

Do we really fear God’s will? Are we actually frustrated with it? Are we disappointed in Him? Does His way in us discourage us? Or are we being strategically confused in our thinking by an adversary?

What we are dealing with is adversarial “strongholds” – and do not underestimate the enormous power they have upon us. As the word implies they have “hold” of our thinking processes, and they are very “strong” – thus “strongholds.”

Pull Down, Cast Down

…  pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations …

These strongholds are adversarial imaginations, or unscriptural “reckonings” (Concordant Literal New Testament) of God and His will. Strongholds that possess our thinking must be pulled down, but how?

Well we, in and of ourselves, are personally powerless to bring them down. They are beyond our own ability to overthrow; but we can rest in the fact that the battle is the Lord’s, and the divine weapons of our warfare are completely sufficient – they are all-sufficient to pull and cast down these well-established dictators. The divine viewpoint can ably overthrow the mental coup of the adversary. Our weapons are indeed “mighty through God” – to the pulling down of these strongholds. This is, as Paul declares elsewhere, the renewing of our minds.

Be not conformed to this age: but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove the will of God, that it is good, and acceptable, and perfect (Romans 12:2).

God’s will – His plan and purpose – is good, and acceptable (well pleasing), and perfect, regardless of what our Adversary attempts to place in our minds to the contrary. God’s will alone is having its absolute way in the minute details of our lives, as He alone is sovereign to do so. For, masterfully “He works all things after the counsel of His Own will” (Ephesians 1:1l). The renewed mind proves this grand truth to our hearts, providing much needed release from the bondage of the enemy. It is then that we can rest, being assured with Paul,

That He Who has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6).

God’s will for your life is good, well pleasing and perfect – as it is for all of His creation. We may not always be able to see it when we are caught up in the middle of some trial; but do not give way to the Adversary’s attack upon the goodness of God and His will in your life. This is his modus operandi all the way back to Eden’s garden – that God somehow withholds that which is good from us.

How do you imagine God’s dealings in your life?

What do you reckon as to His will? Do you doubt that He has you exactly where He wants you? Or, are you heeding the satanic questioning of the great wisdom of His will?

Find rest from all of the mental anguish that wars against the sovereign God. You will, with me, find this rest in the renewed mind; for faith casts down these challenges against the nature and character of Elohim – the Placer and Subjector – and embraces Father’s will for our lives as good, and acceptable, and perfect. After all, would we really have it any other way than His will for our lives? Then give up the faithless struggle against it.

I have for now, and peace has returned to my heart and mind.

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
© Bible Student’s Notebook™

Worldly Losses

If we have God – no other loss is irreparable! There is surely enough in God’s love to compensate a thousand times for every earthly deprivation! Our lives may be stripped bare – home, friends, riches, comforts, every sweet voice of love, every note of joy – and we may be driven out from brightness and music and tenderness and shelter into the cold ways of sorrow. Yet if we have God Himself left – ought it not to suffice? Yes, is not He Himself infinitely more than all His gifts?

J.R. Miller (1840-1912)
Living Without Worry

The Furnace of Affliction

Sooner or later, affliction and sorrow come to every Christian. We ought, therefore, to have true views about pain, about the divine reasons for sending it, and about the mission on which it comes. We ought to know, also, how to endure suffering so as to get from it the blessing, which its hot hand brings to us.

While they do not solve all the mystery of human suffering, the Scriptures show, at least, that suffering is no accident in God’s world – but is one of His messengers; and that it comes not as an enemy – but as a friend on an errand of blessing. The design of God, in all the afflictions which He sends upon His people, is to advance their purification of character. It is very clearly taught in the Word of God, that suffering is necessary in preparing us for heavenly glory.

We must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God (Acts 14:22).

Tribulation is God’s threshing, not to harm us or to destroy us – but to separate what is heavenly in us from what is earthly. His puts us in the fire of purification, until His Own image shines reflected in the gold! His prunings mean greater fruitfulness. In whatever form the suffering comes – the purpose of the pain is merciful. In all our life in this world, God is purifying us – and suffering is one of the chief agents which He employs.

We glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope (Romans 5:3-4).

Suffering develops in us qualities of Christian character, which cannot be developed in any other way.

Afflictions must be received as God’s messengers. They often come in very somber garb, and it is only when we receive them in faith that they disclose to us their merciful aspect and mission.

We should therefore receive afflictions reverently, as sent from God. We may be assured that there is always some blessing for us, in pain’s hot hand. There is some golden fruit, wrapped up in the rough husk. God designs to burn off some sins from us, in every fire through which He calls us to pass.

J.R. Miller (1840-1912)
Living Without Worry

Adam’s Descendants’ Middle Name

Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward (Job 5:7).

“Trouble” is Adam’s descendants’ middle name. It seems that’s all we have. It is a part of the daily battle we face.

God has called us to do His will in what appears to be the most disadvantaged circumstances. Our hearts sink regularly. Then we remember that something has not gone “wrong” – instead, this is His plan: to use weak, foolish, despised, unqualified nothingness as His vessels so as to bring about Divine Glory!

For you see your calling, brothers, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, has God chosen, yes, and things which are not, to bring to nothing things that are: that no flesh should glory in His presence. But of Him are you in Christ Jesus, Who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that, according as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.” (I Corinthians 1:26-31).

“Seeing” this divine perspective is all an issue of pure faith. Everything else (all of our senses and worldly reasoning) begs and pleads for a change in the circumstances.

When reading through Israel’s history in the Old Testament we can get so discouraged for them, and God. Every time it looked like they were on the right track, they turned away from God’s purpose and plan. Or, so we would think, until we realize that no matter what happened, God had a plan, and that nothing that Israel (or Satan) did was going to thwart His Plan and Purpose for them. So it is today: we lose sight of this tremendous truth in our own lives, expecting that God is working differently than He ever has, and so we play the fool to our emotions by letting the old man dictate our feelings and actions.

Why does it take us so long to learn these truths? We are amazed when we read Paul saying that he had to learn some things – amazed because he had personal contact with the Lord Jesus Christ; but even this did not provide an instantaneous arrival of conviction and faith for him. So it is with us: we are learning to rest and trust Him in the midst of our “troubles.”

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body (II Corinthians 4:8-10).

Joseph, during his troubled times after being sold into slavery, may have had occasion to complain and grieve about his circumstances – Scripture says little, if anything about this – but one thing we do know: knowing His God, Joseph maintained his faith and divine perspective, and in the midst of and in spite of those “troubles” he became a “vessel of mercy” (Romans 9:23) and a testimony to the wonderful grace of Almighty God. In so doing we learn that while the “trouble” of this world may appear as “evil against us,” God means it as good unto us (Genesis 50:20).

The story of Joseph, and many others we have of which to read from the Scriptures, are meant to be examples for us (I Corinthians 10:11).

Instead of reacting in despair, whether looking back at Israel’s “troubles” or living in the midst of our own, we should read “the rest of the story” and look ahead to see the “riches of His glory” which God has prepared for us (Romans 9:23). Let us remember that suffering ­– trouble, if you will – is a gift from God (Philippians 1:29), and is intended for our benefit and good, in order that His Divine Glory and Life may be manifest in us to the rest of the world around us.

Almighty God is performing a wonderful work in us (Philippians 1:6; 2:13). Let us praise God that we have been chosen by Him to be channels of His blessing to those whose lives we have occasion to touch, lives filled with as much trouble as ours are. Let us learn to say, as Paul said, that we are “always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.”

André Sneidar
Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
Daily Email Goodies™
© 2008

A Personal Prayer of Faith

Over the years of Christian publishing it has been popular to issue collections of prayers. I will share a prayer with you that you’ll probably not find in one of these collections.

God works to bring us to a place of weakness, so that we might be totally abandoned to Christ alone as our life. On many such occasions the Father has so moved in my life as to pray a faith-emboldened prayer similar to what I will now share with you. I do so for the encouragement of our many dear readers who have experienced this same working of Dad in their hearts and lives as well.

The following prayer is based on Philippians 2:13:

For it is God Who works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.

Father,

I seem so lost most of the time. My life and heart appear to be such a big mess. I have no idea what I am doing or where I am going, let alone what I should be doing, or where I should be going, or even who I really am. My heart aches and is so heavy. I give up!

After all, it’s not about me anyway, right? I can’t live the Christian life. I never could. I never will. It’s You or nothing – but, the mess of my life is You working in me. You said so! You said that I was Your workmanship; You started me, You will complete and finish me. I am the workmanship, You are the worker. I am the clay, You are the potter. That’s all there is to it.

I know that You know what You are doing, and Your Word is true. So, if You want to make a complete mess out of my life – have at it. I am Yours, and I am Your work. So I quit. If anything is going to get done then You’ll have to be the one Who does it. After all, that’s what YOU said, right? So, You must want this mess. Therefore by faith I will quit and let You do whatever You want with me.

You said that You work in me to “will” and to “do.” So, I don’t “want-to” anymore. So, I quit. All I know to “do” anyway is what I have been taught all my life to “do” from the religious system; and if I know anything, that is all empty and vain, and it doesn’t even work. Yet it is all I have known. So, I quit – and since You work in me to “will,” I am not going to “do” anything else with my spiritual life unless I “want” to, and right now I don’t “want” to do anything.

My heart is so heavy, it is so empty, and You are responsible. After all, You are God, not me. You are the Potter, not me. You are the Father, not me; and God, the Potter, and the Father are all responsible agents!

So, if You do give me a “will” to do what You want, You also are just as responsible to “do” it in me. You said so! Then even if You work the “will” in me, I will make a mess out of everything, because even if I have the “want-to” I can’t “do” it either. I don’t even know how. So, You’ll have to do both parts, just like You said you would do. Therefore if I don’t “want” to do anything, and nothing gets “done” then it will just be Your fault, because I am just a creature – You’re the One Who is the Creator. So there, I quit. Now it’s all up to You. I am just going to trust You; You are all that I have, and I am going to rest in You. My quitting is going to be, for me, an act of faith. I am going to rest in this quitting, because my quitting is trusting You. I am NOT trusting You to help me; I just quit. I am trusting You to do it all Yourself. After all, You are God, and You’re responsible.

If by chance You don’t follow through with what You said, I am going to hold You responsible on the Day of Jesus Christ. When I stand before You, You’ll see what You made, and if You don’t like it – well, I’m Your workmanship, I’m Your creation, so you can’t blame me. If my life is just a big mess, it will be Your big mess, because I am just Your creature, and You made me weak and subject to vanity. I didn’t even ask to be here; I am a product of Your Own making. It all happened on Your watch. If You expected anything different out of me – in the weakness of who I am without You – then You were supposed to provide the “will” and the “do.” You said so!

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
Bible Student’s Notebook
© 2010