In one morning, it was like I went from being 38 years old to being 88 years old.
This summer, I had my gallbladder removed. In the days which followed my surgery, I could do very little for myself. I had an all-liquid diet on my birthday - I will never forget that one! I needed help using the bathroom and I slept in a recliner for nearly a week. Every time I wanted to get up, I had to call for help.
While I was grateful for the removal of a poorly functioning organ that caused me no shortage of pain, I was frustrated and annoyed. Needing that much help was not easy. Depending on others is not my preference. I much prefer being able to take care of myself.
Though I’ve left the liquid diet behind and I’ve regained all of my physical capacity post-surgery and a lot of my pre-illness diet, I’ve not forgotten the lessons I learned.
One of my reflections from that time is that I would much rather depend on myself rather than others, including God. Facing my limits and neediness continually introduced a level of discomfort and humility that I did not enjoy.
This month, our Worship Now theme is God the Provider. In keeping with that theme, I want to encourage you to reset your expectations for your relationship with God and your own capacity.
Consider how Jesus taught His disciples to pray in Matthew 6:7-13.
“When you pray, don’t babble on and on as the Gentiles do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again. Don’t be like them, for your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him! Pray like this Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us today the food we need, and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us. And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.”
Allow your focus to go to the line about food. Jesus invites us to pray like this - “Give us today the food we need.” It seems that Jesus wants to be The Provider in our lives on a daily basis, giving us the food we need for today.
Truthfully, that’s not the kind of relationship I’m looking for. Rich Villodas accurately describes the difference between the kind of relationship Jesus wants and the kind of relationship I want.
“Jesus tells us to pray for daily bread, but we’d rather have a Costco relationship with God. We'd rather have stuff in bulk so as not to come back to God so often. But we can't live without daily dependence.”
Like a large purchase from Costco, I prefer to depend on the supply I’ve accrued for a long period of time rather than on God to provide a new, fresh supply each day. I prefer independence rather than dependence. Do you feel the same?
God wants us to depend on Him as The Provider rather than on the provision He provides. When we depend on God as The Provider, we’re acknowledging our limited capacity, our neediness and the fragileness of our humanity. When we depend on the provision, we deceive ourselves into thinking we have no limits, no needs, and a sense of invulnerability.
Instead of expecting God to stock your shelves to overflowing, what if you expected God to give what you need for each day as you need it? What if you expected that you’d need to turn to God in dependence each morning rather than only going to Him when your efforts at independence failed?
Based upon the prayer Jesus taught in Matthew 6, God does not consider being The Provider to be a burden or affliction. Like a father who enjoys providing for those He loves, God delights in meeting our needs and yearns for us to come to Him in dependence.
Just as I had to unlearn to get up on my own, we need to unlearn independence from God. Instead of going to God in prayer when we feel needy every once in a while, we need to learn to pray each morning for what we need.
Thrive Worship talks about this childlike element of dependence within our faith. In their song, "Coming Back," they sing,
Experiencing God as Our Provider may require us to recapture our identity as a child of God and our faith in God as Father. It seems fitting that a prayer which begins with “Our Father” leads us to a daily acknowledgment of our need and anticipation of provision from the One who loves us more than any other.
As Rich Villodas wrote, “we cannot live without daily dependence.” I pray you embrace your humanness and increase your dependence today.
Scott Savage is a pastor and a writer. He leads Cornerstone Church in Prescott, Arizona. Scott is married to Dani and they are the parents of three “little savages.” He loves helping hurting people forgive others through his Free to Forgive course and you can read more of his writing at scottsavagelive.com.
