God is faithful, who has called you into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Cor. 1:9)
I don’t like asking for help. My wife thinks I’m crazy. Recently we moved from one place to another with decades of accumulated stuff. We moved almost all of it ourselves except for a couple hours when the two or three of us simply weren’t strong enough to move some huge and weighty pieces of furniture.
If we try this approach in our spiritual lives, we will fail every time. The truth is that all our moral lifting requires God’s help. We cannot “try” our way into goodness or holiness. God calls us to be a holy people, but he does not expect us to do it on our own.
It starts when we come to Christ and initially receive the Holy Spirit. We are drawn into God’s power. We are plugged into the Spirit. At first, we may have some dead spots in the connection. We can be “in Christ” but still show signs of our fleshliness. It can show itself in disunity among us. It ultimately reflects some lack of love toward one another and some dividedness in our will toward God.
Ultimately, God calls us to move beyond the carnal, divided life to a life devoted fully to God through the Spirit. God is faithful. He who called us to be holy will empower us individually and corporately to become what we are meant to be.
Stop trying and start relying on God to become holy.
Ken Schenck is vice president for university partnerships with Campus EUD. He previously served as vice president for Houghton College (NY) and dean of Wesley Seminary at Indiana Wesleyan University.
© 2022 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.
