Episode #299 What I Discovered About Needing God Every Day – Unforced Rhythms of Grace

Have you ever noticed that there's some seasons in life where your dependence on God is just blatant? It's just overwhelming. You're in circumstances that you don't feel equipped to handle. You're facing pain, you're facing a lot of unknowns. You're struggling with something. You are so aware of your dependence on God, that it's just a constant thing that you're thinking about, that you're praying through.

Have you ever been in seasons like that? I know I definitely have, but then I also can go through seasons where my dependence on him kind of fades into the background. Things feel familiar and routine. I'm hitting a stride in work. I feel like I kind of know what I'm doing with my kids and parenting. Like things feel good, they feel easier, peaceful, and I can kind of forget that I am still in dependence on him. That I need him for the air that I breathe, that I can depend on him more than I depend on myself.

No matter what season we're in, we are depending on God every day. And that's a really beautiful thing because he is constant. He is always showing up for us. He is always active in our lives and we can depend on him because he is faithful.
In John chapter 15, Jesus is talking about the vine and how we're the branches, and he gives us this analogy of remaining connected to him. And so I'll read John 15, verse 5. “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)

I'm thinking about this today because I can feel that “apart from me, you can do nothing” really strongly in those first types of seasons that I mentioned. You know, things are really hard. I dunno what I'm doing. Someone I love is sick or has died. Something's going wrong and my business and I dunno how to fix it. Something isn't turning out the way that I thought. I am struggling with my own health. All of those kind of things. It's easy for me to see man, apart from him, I can't do anything.
But in the second type of season when I feel like things are familiar or going well, I can sometimes feel like I'm doing all right on my own. Like, yes, I wanna stay connected to God 'cause I love him and he loves me, but I kind of have things under control. Well, I might have some things under wraps, like there's skills that we have that we're growing in. There's competencies that we have, but I really need him for everything. And not just in a need, but I also can delight in partnering with God in everything. Even something I know how to do on my own. It's better, it's more fun. It's more flourishing when I get to do it with God.

I'm reading Richard Foster's Celebration of Discipline, and he talks about cultivating holy dependency. He says, “Holy dependency means that you are utterly and completely dependent upon God for anything significant to happen. There is inward travail that the evil will weaken and that the good will rise up. You look forward to God acting and moving and teaching and wooing and winning. The work is God’s and not yours.”

There's an inward travail, a working, an inward labor picture. Like a woman who's pregnant about to give birth. There's this inward working that the evil will weaken and that good will rise up. That is what God does for us.

Foster says, “We learn that we must live in a daily, hourly dependence upon the Father. And when we have learned that, the joy and peace that comes from resting in His care far surpasses any earthly striving.”

Now that awareness really speaks to me, especially considering the whole visual of Jesus being the vine and we being the branches. We can rest in his care. Branches rest in the care of the vine because they are connected. They grow and they flourish. Because they are connected, they receive the nutrients and the water that they need.

We can grow aware of our dependency on him and reject ways that we might have strove out on our own, based on our own work and effort and striving in the past. And one of the ways I'm seeing this really practically right now is in writing. I am working on a series of kids books with a co-author. They're really fun kid detective books, for kids age 7 to 11. And in the process of solving mysteries, we're teaching kids discipleship how to live as Christ followers and in connection with him.
And it is so fun because we're aiming to partner with God in this work. It's in our prayers, it's in our perspective. It's in the practical aspects of writing, asking God to weave in story and truth, and elevate our craft and all of these things. And he shows up. We're constantly being armed with these testimonies of how he wove things into the story that we didn't see before, or how this plot element that was just for fun now is showing up in this really beautiful way for this powerful moment that the character gets to have with God.

It is so fun. We get to live from this holy dependency. We get to be dependent on God, and that's not a weakness, it’s wisdom. Because he cares for us, because he's the vine. We get to be the branches.

And so here's a question that I encourage you to take to God today:

God, where are you inviting me to lean on you instead of my own strength?

Have a good talk.

And if you've been encouraged by this content, please share it with a friend and help them grow in their conversational relationship with God too!

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