The Lord spoke to me the other morning about being self-reliant and he showed me the dangers of being self-reliant. The Church has become so much like the world and we have become more self-reliant than we have been God dependent. We like the world have become dependent on the jobs and money and paychecks and social security, medication, doctors, insurance, Medicare and Medicaid and think we are covered, we are secure if we have any of this but the truth is all of that can be wiped out in just a second of time! That’s the danger of self-reliance and thinking that if we just get enough of what the world offers us to cover everything then we are going to be just fine. They may offer everything to us but when we sign up then it never covers all they promised, read the fine print and the disclaimers that go with the offer, and you soon find out they didn’t cover all they claimed but led us to believe it was there. Not true with what God has promised us. All of His promises come with no fine print or any at all disclaimers.
See being self-reliant we are subject to deception. Eve learned that lesson in the Garden of Eden when she was deceived by the serpent. She ate of the forbidden fruit because she was led to believe she would become like God when in truth she already was. See the world is always offering you what you already are and have in Christ Jesus through faith. Then when we bit on it through their deception it creates all kinds of chaos in our lives!
Then the Lord told me this self-reliance and self-dependency creates all kinds of fear. Fear of not getting enough money! Fear of not being able to pay bills! Fear of losing a home, a car, a job, you name the rest because I know all of you know what I am talking about when it comes to this fear that comes from relying on self. The truth is that God dependency creates just the opposite of all of that with true life, joy, peace and security.
The Lord told me there was another thing that self-reliance creates and that is self destruction! Anything we depend on that is not dependent on God is self-destructive! I mean look at all the Government of the United States without God dependency has offered its people and it sounded really good and secure but now look at the destruction, the failure of those programs such as Medicare and Medicaid and the Affordable Healthcare, job creation for everyone and should I even mention Social Security? I just read the other day one local hospital had to fork out over eleven million dollars to cover the cost of patients because these government programs wouldn’t pay all the cost of being hospitalized. Now think about that all over the United States! The government programs are creating big problems for these hospitals. Man’s programs without God will always self-destruct. The Bible tells us,
Psalm 33:12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD;… KJV
See the programs of mere men are self-destructive when dependency of God is not at the top of all of them! No nation can survive without its dependency on God.
See the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ was never supposed to be self-reliant! I know some of you will say, but Jane God helps those who help themselves. We do have a part to play in everything but the truth is that Jesus, the sample Son, never was self-reliant, self-dependent. He said one time that He could of His own self do nothing but whatever I see the Father doing I do and whatever I hear the Father saying I say. Now does that sound to you like that is the kind of reliance we the Church is supposed to have as well? We must be God dependent.
That leads me to another important truth that everyone has an overlord and it is either God or Satan. Jesus even told us we could not serve God and mammon and a lot of Christians are self-reliant and thus serving mammon and have no time for God. Why? Because they think that job and that money will keep them and pay their bills. They are self-reliant having a job and working for every dime they can get. Haven’t you heard that phrase, “I’m a self-made man?” They accredit all their success and everything they have and become to their own efforts of getting a good education, their own hard work and ingenuity. The truth is without the mercy of God they would never have or be anything!
Being God dependent is simply hearing and then doing and supernatural results only come that way. The Bible tells us,
Isaiah 1:19 If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land: KJV
Now we shall eat the good of the land if we are willing to be God dependent.
Another translation of Isaiah 1:19 says,
Isaiah 1:19 If you will only let me help you, if you will only obey, then I will make you rich! TLB
God tells us we need His help! If we want to be rich then we need His help! If we want to be healthy we need His help! If we want to be successful in business we need His help! If we want to be the best government representative of the people of any nation we need God’s help!
I think the world has come to the place they don’t need God and they don’t need God’s help and that has infiltrated into the Church. I mean we got our governments to help us with their programs, we got the banks for money, we got the doctors and medicine and technology for our health, we got the best colleges to educate us, we got all these things and we don’t need God. But God told us, “Thou shalt have no other God before me.” Why did He say that? Just to be mean? Is that what the Ten Commandments were all about to just be mean to us? No! Everyone of those Ten Commandments were given so we don’t self-destruct! We need God and not a false god!
So for those of us who are worried even about our financial increase this scripture, Isaiah 1:19 shows us that we have to become God dependent.
Think about it, if self-reliance creates deception, self-destruction, all kinds of fear, Satan is the overlord and we have to serve mammon; then we know that God dependency will surely create perception of truth, avoidance of destruction, a spirit of faith that moves mountains, Jesus is Lord of everything and the Kingdom of God’s economy is our source for everything. Now that’s true security and isn’t all of that what we want?
Determine to be more God dependent every day. How do you do that? Share everything with the Lord that concerns you and give it to Him, cast that care over on Him even if you have to keep coming back to give it to Him again and again. Study the Word and meditate to find the promises God has given to you concerning this problem and solution to the problem you are facing and then begin to declare those promises every day. This will keep you from taking back the care that you gave to the Lord. Then exercise your faith in your reliance on Him by listening to what He tells you to do and then step out and obey what the Spirit of God tells you to do. Then give the Lord much praise and thanks and worship that He is truly the One you are counting on, truly depending on.