As I was praying recently, a thought occurred to me: “I am nothing except what You are through me.” We love to pose and posture. We love to talk about our accomplishments and achievements. But the reality is nothing we do would be possible if not for God. He created us, gave us our skills and abilities, provided our wisdom, and nurtured our development.
Not a single thing we have ever done would be possible if not for some gift of God. That doesn’t mean everything we’ve done is good or blessed, but it does mean we are all absolutely useless and weak except for the providence of our loving Creator.
As long as we are pursuing things of our own interest, we will never become the person we were created to be. Our entire life is designed to bring glory to God. Nothing we achieve outside of that purpose will have any lasting value. It won’t mean anything when we die and meet Jesus face to face. All that matters is what He does through us and what we do for His glory. Our greatest personal achievements are the hay and stubble that will burn up in the fire (1 Corinthians 3:12-15). Only that which is done for Christ will survive the flame of His holy judgement.
So much of our time is spent plotting and scheming about what we will do with our life. From the monotony of our day to day activities to our wildest dreams, we spend an immensely inordinate amount of time thinking about ourselves and our life. So little of our time is focused on Jesus, and that is the only time that actually matters. We act as if we are everything and have the extra bonus of knowing God. We are nothing without God, and if we continue to think otherwise we may find out too late we never actually knew Him at all (Matthew 7:21-23, Matthew 25:31-46).
We are nothing except what He is through us. Our focus every day should be on what He can do through us. He can only do as much as we allow Him to do. He loves us so much He actually lets us limit the amount of power He uses in our lives. God never forces Himself on anyone. He desires to live in perfect harmony with His followers, but will sit on the sidelines if that’s what we insist.
What would your life look like if you allowed God to unleash His power through you? Are you so deceived and deluded to think things would change for the worse? I will never understand why I choose to limit God’s power in lieu of my own selfish desires. What God has for us is so much better than anything we could ever dream up for ourselves. We are nothing without God. He is everything. If we let Him, He will empower us to become the person He created us to be. From this day forward, make it all about Jesus. We are nothing except what He is through us.