Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to Me? Tell the sons of Israel to go forward. And as for you, lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, and the sons of Israel shall go through the midst of the sea on dry land.”
I have been having an interesting conversation with a friend of mine this week. The gist of it is that as Christians, we sometimes wait around for God to do things for us when He has already provided everything we need. We live a very passive Christianity when God has in mind a partnership. Perhaps we do not cognitively think that we can be idle and God will do everything for us but our behaviors indicate that we may believe this is the case.
Moses and the Israelites certainly had that mentality. They were backed up to the Red Sea and Pharaoh’s army was closing in. Can you imagine the wailing and caterwauling that must have been going on? God said, “Why are you crying out to me?” In other words, “You have and the sons of Israel have all you need for this situation. Stretch out your hand and part the sea.” Wow! Isn’t that something? “You lift up your hand”, God says.
But now, wait a minute. Haven’t we been taught that we are not supposed to be working in the power of our might? Absolutely! But do you really think Moses parted the Red Sea in the power of his might? Of course not. This is called moving in the power of God’s might, using your authority in Christ. This is the secret. We don’t sit on our hands and wait for God to drop things in our lap because He has given us His name and His authority. Likewise, we don’t move in our power or wisdom but rather in His. We are partners with God through Christ Jesus.
I see so many ineffective, powerless Christians and this just ought not be. Our Father is the big guy, the creator, Yahweh but we go around like orphans. Look, if you were the child of Queen Elizabeth would you go around like you had no authority? Of course not but one key is that you would need to understand your authority.
This is a really big deal. We need to learn to walk in the power of God. We must learn to work with the Holy Spirit and live in the blessing of our Lord Jesus. This is a life of balance, neither relying on our strength nor resigning ourselves to the couch awaiting miracles to fall upon us. I encourage you to ponder this subject and send us your thoughts. Perhaps we can have a good dialogue about how this actually works out in real life.
