Declaration of In Dependence
“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…”
Those famous words comprise the opening sentiments of the document that has become known as the “Declaration of Independence”. This document was a declaration ratified by congress on July 4th, 1776 by the 13 founding states of the United States of America. It went on to state 27 grievances those United States had against the King of Britain, which provided justified reasoning for the assertion of their independence from Britain.
Their decision was built on the belief, “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government,”. And, “…when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security,”
I thought of this document recently when I was having breakfast with a friend. He shared something I thought was very profound. He told me of his discovery of a deep desire for independence. He realized that he had a natural propensity to live independently from God.
Most of us were raised to be independent. In fact, this is lauded in our culture. You’re successful and strong if you’re not dependent on anyone. Independence is celebrated.
My friend shared how he had bought into this mindset like so many of us, but he had also transferred this into his walk with the Lord. He was trying to live independent from God – only calling on Him when he needed Him.
He looked me in the eye and said,
“I see my tendency to live independent from God, but I want to live in dependence on God.”
Wow – what a profound declaration.
No more to live in my own strength, No more to depend on my own abilities, my own resources, my own experiences. No more living life my way. No more of God’s will my way.
God is inviting us to make a “Declaration of In Dependence” – to live in dependence on Him. To trust Him. To believe what He says is true. To obey Him when we don’t understand. God’s will, God’s way.
“My hope is built on nothing less, than Jesus’ blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus’ name. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand.”
This classic hymn is a beautiful Declaration of In Dependence. When we choose to live in dependence on God we are building our life on the rock – anything else is sand. Living independently from God we can gain the whole world, but lose our soul.
Dependence on God means crucifying ourselves and living in Him. Our life is found only in Him – outside of Him there is no life. He is the vine and we are the branch. Our life is inextricably tied to Him.
Are you living independently of God, or in dependence on God? The latter leads to life, the former to death. If you’re not experiencing all the life you thirst for, perhaps you are living independently from God. Dependence on God leads to the life we long for, but it begins with death to ourselves so we can live in Christ.
Make your Declaration of In Dependence. Set your hope on Jesus’ blood and righteousness. Wholly lean on Jesus’ name. Stand on the solid rock of Jesus.
John 15:4, 5
“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.”
Galatians 2:20
“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”
Matthew 7:26
“Everyone who hears these words of Mine and does not act on them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.”
Don’t Waste Your Sorrows
I lay there on my bed with my leg, fully encompassed by a plaster cast, sticking straight up in the air like a submarine periscope. This was the only position that gave me some degree of relief from the pain.
I had shattered my leg playing soccer. My shin had broken in 3 places and was bent at a right angle when they loaded me onto the stretcher to rush me to emergency. They had set it 3 times, and now I was in a full length cast.
The breaks were painful to say the least, but it was the nervous damage that was the most agonizing. The breaks were so violent they damaged the nerve to my foot and nearly severed it. Have you ever really smashed your funny bone and had that shooting, overwhelming nervous pain run through your arm? That was what my leg felt like on an ongoing basis.
As I lay in my bed immobile for days on end with my great white periscope, I had much time to reflect and talk to Jesus. I knew the “suffering” I was going through was part of the Lord’s work in my life. I was desperate to learn what He wanted to teach me.
“Lord, please help me to learn what you are trying to teach me – I don’t want to have to go through this again.”
As I cried out to the Lord to help me to learn, I felt like He whispered something very simple to me,
“You cannot miss what I am doing in your heart if you simply surrender to me.”
So I didn’t need to figure it out? I didn’t need to try hard not to miss the lesson?
No. I needed to simply ask the Lord to do His work in my heart.
“Lord, I offer my heart to you. Please do all you want to do in me.”
I needed to journey with Him through the pain, through the sorrow, through the suffering and He would work His purposes in me. I needed to not try to get out of this situation, but to meet Him in it.
When we’re experiencing pain, suffering and sorrow we often ask the Lord to deliver us from it, instead of asking Him to accomplish His purposes through it. We want out of it instead of meeting Jesus in it. The fact is, we often meet the Lord in the midst of suffering. It is our times of greatest grief that are often our times of greatest growth.
This life is filled with both joy and sorrow, deliverance and suffering. Is God’s heart for us to live in freedom, joy, hope, peace, strength, faith, love, deliverance and wholeness? Yes. Does God heal and deliver? Yes. Does He also invite us into pain, suffering and sorrow to discover more of Him? Yes.
I read a book when I was in my 20’s called Don’t Waste Your Sorrows, by Paul Billheimer. What a great gift this book was to me. After reading the book I actually wanted to suffer so I could better know Christ. It helped me to gain an eternal perspective on painful experiences. It enabled me to see how God has planned for the church to be trained through these kinds of circumstances. It is our proper response to the difficulties in life that enables us to grow in Jesus, if we don’t “waste our sorrows”.
Are you in the midst of a great sorrow, a difficult circumstance or some sort of suffering? Invite Jesus into your situation and meet Him there. Ask Him to help you discover Him in the midst of the circumstance and to work His will in you.
Make growth your primary objective, not escape. He will deliver you – in His timing, not yours.
I have heard it said, “The will of God won’t take you where the grace of God can’t keep you.” He is able to make grace abound to you, in every circumstance.
Don’t waste your sorrows – meet Jesus in the midst of them and discover His heart for you and for others through you.
Hebrews 12:11
“All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”
Romans 5:3-5
“And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”
Philippians 3:10, 11
“That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”
2 Corinthians 4:17, 18
“For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison”.
You Gotta Have Faith
“Crime is a disease – I’m the cure.”
That statement, uttered by Lieutenant Marion ‘Cobra’ Cobretti played by Sylvester Stallone, was THE line from his 1986 film “Cobra”. Cobra would probably be considered one of the low lights in Stallone’s filmography.
In Cobra, Stallone plays a take-no-prisoners, free spirited cop who does whatever is necessary to rid the streets of crime. It is a violent mash up of cheesy one liners, over-acting and innumerable rounds of bullets to blow away the bad guys.
Back in 1986 I saw this movie in the theater. It was not memorable in any particular way, except for a line that has stood out to me from the movie for over 30 years now.
At one point in the film Stallone has rescued a beautiful young lady, played by Brigitte Nielsen, from a horrendous crime. In her traumatized state ‘Cobra’ is taking her to a hidden location to keep her safe so she can testify against the bad guys – who turn out to far bigger and badder than either had realized.
On the way to their secret destination, while conversing in the car, the woman’s terror begins to resurface. The young woman’s primary concern is her safety. How is she going to live through this? What’s going to stop the bad guys from finding her? Who will protect her? Who can she trust?
As she begins to tear up with fear Stallone slowly turns to her. He focuses his steely gaze at her from behind his silver reflector aviator sun glasses. He dramatically removes the ever present match stick from his mouth, then utters this phrase,
“You gotta have faith.”
Sounds like something Jesus said doesn’t it?
The thing is, faith isn’t the answer. The object of our faith is the answer.
Everybody in the world has faith. But faith in what? Millions of people have faith in money. Many have faith in their own skills and abilities. Countless numbers have faith in everything from hard work to education, institutions of all kinds to family or friends, intelligence and logic to mythology and idols.
What really matters is what you have put your faith in. Or perhaps more accurately stated, what really matters is who you have put your faith in.
The only faith that truly saves and transforms us is faith in God. Faith in anything other than Jesus will ultimately falter.
So what does it mean to have faith in Jesus?
Put very simply, faith in Jesus means we believe He is who He said He is. As C.S. Lewis said, we can only come to 3 conclusions about Jesus: He is either a lunatic, a liar or Lord. Faith in Jesus is believing He is Lord – just like He said He is.
Having faith in Jesus also means we believe what He said is true. Our compass, our Truth, is the Word of God.
Having Faith in Jesus and the Word of God also means we believe in things we haven’t seen yet. As Hebrews 11:1 tells us, “Faith is confidence in what we hope for, and assurance about what we do not see.”
How can we have faith in something that hasn’t happened yet? How can we have faith in something, or someone, we cannot see? Well, it’s because we believe what God said is true. Someone once said to me, “I don’t really think of faith as belief without proof, but trust without reservation.”
Our faith, a faith that is living and active, is really based in a relationship with Jesus. When we know Jesus, when we have experienced the reality of His love and life, we trust Him. The deeper our relationship with Him, the deeper our trust is, and, therefore, the deeper our faith is.
However, without faith we cannot have a relationship with Christ. As Hebrews 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”
Faith in Jesus is our only hope. Faith in anything apart from Christ is like building a house on the sand.
Yes, you gotta have faith – in Christ alone.
Galatians 2:16
“know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified.”
2 Corinthians 5:7
“For we live by faith, not by sight.”
Romans 5:1, 2
“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God.”
Mark 11:22
“’Have faith in God,’ Jesus answered.”
Rivers of Life
“When I yell, ‘Stop paddling!’ you need to stop paddling. When I yell, ‘Get low!” you need to crouch down in the boat. When I yell, “Hold on!’ you need to grab onto the life lines in the boat.”
Simple. I can do that. This is going to be awesome…
And with that we began our white-water rafting adventure on the Rio Toro through the heart of Costa Rican rainforests. Anne, David, Benjamin, and I were all very excited about this adventure. Well, all the MacLean men were excited. Anne was not, but she was willing to give it a shot for the sake of the family.
We had a small raft: the four of us and 2 guides. The guides were steering, we were paddling. David and I were at the front sitting up on the sides of the raft, with Benjamin and Anne behind us, and the guides at the stern.
The water was exhilarating. It was invigorating. These boiling, churning waters were taking us outside our comfort zone into new realms of adrenalized living. What a rush!
Our adventure turned into a little more of an adventure than we bargained for. The rapids seemed to be getting larger and larger. As we headed into one particularly large rapid, our guide shouted out, “Stop paddling!”. I couldn’t hear him, so I kept attacking the river with vigorous strokes. “Get low!” he yelled. I kept paddling oblivious to his instructions. “Hold on!” he finally commanded us…
That’s when I was catapulted out of the boat. Well, not totally out of the boat. My legs got caught under a safety line so I was on my back in the water, with my legs over the side of the raft in the boat, as I was being dragged through the rapids. Thankfully David came over to my rescue and pulled me back into the boat.
Anne was horrified. However, not nearly as horrified as she would be in the next rapid. This rapid catapulted both David and I over the side of the boat – again with our legs trapped in the boat so we were being dragged down the river. Anne and Benjamin both came to my aid, which almost flipped the raft over completely. Working with stealthy strategy they were able to haul both David and I back into the boat.
That’s when we realized our guides were gone.
Before we knew it, they popped back into the boat exclaiming, “Whew, that was a big one!”
What we experienced that day was the awesome power of a river. There seemed to be no end to the water. It kept flowing and flowing and flowing. It easily swept us up into an exhilifying adventure far greater than ourselves.
The life of the Rio Toro was contagious. We felt alive in a way we never would have otherwise.
I recalled this adventure when I spoke recently with a sister in Christ. She was MCing our global leadership conference. Her prayer was that the life of Christ would flow through her when she was on stage.
As I prayed for her I remembered what Jesus promised us. He said we have rivers of life flowing inside us. He promised we have springs of living water nourishing our soul. He promised that His life, the presence of the Holy Spirit, is in us – like a river.
I believe the rivers of life Jesus promised us have no limitations. There is always more of His life, His Spirit, He has for us. I believe we need to thank Him we have His river of life – His spring of living water – inside us, and ask Him to keep filling us up to overflowing with His Spirit.
Sometimes those rivers of life will sweep us up into adventure. Sometimes the waters of life will soothe our thirsty soul. Other times the spring of life will bring peace, calm and life.
Let’s drink deeply of His waters of life inside us, and pray my friend’s prayer, “Lord, thank you for your living water inside me. Please flow through me to those around me!”
Yes, we have rivers of living water inside us – let it flow Lord!
John 7:38
“Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.”
John 4:14
“but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Isaiah 58:11
“The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.”
Psalm 1:1-3
“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither – whatever they do prospers.”