From Streams In The Desert

The End Of Our Strength

"Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed" (John 20:29).

How strong is the snare of the things that are seen, and how necessary for God to keep us in the things that axe unseen! If Peter is to walk on the water he must walk; if he is going to swim, he must swim, but he cannot do both. If the bird is going to fly it must keep away from fences and the trees, and trust to its buoyant wings. But if it tries to keep within easy reach of the ground, it will make poor work of flying.

God had to bring Abraham to the end of his own strength, and to let him see that in his own body he could do nothing. He had to consider his own body as good as dead, and then take God for the whole work; and when he looked away from himself, and trusted God alone, then he became fully persuaded that what He had promised, He was able to perform. That is what God is teaching us, and He has to keep away encouraging results until we learn to trust without them, and then He loves to make His Word real in fact as well as faith.
--A. B. Simpson

***

I do not ask that He must prove
His Word is true to me,
And that before I can believe
He first must let me see.
It is enough for me to know
'Tis true because He says 'tis so;
On His unchanging Word I'll stand
And trust till I can understand.
--E. M. Winter

This is the consistent work of God in our lives when we totally surrender our wills to His Will.

The mercy that God gives me anew every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23) is unsanctified mercy without my total surrender to God's Will on a daily basis.

There is no time left for any of us to give ourselves even a single day without a will that is totally surrendered to God's Will.

I must, like David, delight in God's law every day and meditate on God's Word both day and night making God's tabernacle my dwelling place.

The goal of the five-fold ministry gifts (Ephesians 4:11) is two-fold, unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God and to become mature attaining to the fullness of Christ. The goal is unity and maturity and the purpose is to be built up into these two goals. (Ephesians 4:12-13)

Christ is the nourishing root and vine by which we the branches grow into these two things. (Ephesians 4:14-16; John 15:1-8)

Abiding & Abandonment both require trust and patience and these two things look like total surrender with every moment and every life circumstance that I face.

I can say that I will totally surrender but actually doing it is not the easiest thing in the world. Especially when God is lovingly confronting me head on with the ways of living that I have not FULLY surrendered yet.