Dependency is a part of life, and life is an extension of our dependence, the natural state into which we are born. Dependence binds together the start and end of life, and weaves its way throughout. Without any dependence or reliance, our lives feel unstable and insecure. So whom can we lean upon? What can we depend upon? Will it be our own insight or God's power?
After Adam and Eve ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, their eyes were opened and they were ashamed of their nakedness. They then sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves. Yet leaves wither and dry up under the wind and the sun. So the Lord in His mercy made garments of skin for Adam and Eve.
Weaving leaves into coverings comes from leaning upon human understanding. Worldly knowledge can never withstand the tests placed upon it. Using animal coverings to make clothing is God's way; they can endure. Our ways as humans are indeed limited! Yet unless people have exhausted every possible human solution to their problems and tasted enough bitterness of failure, they often cannot accept God's way. In this life, whatever we encounter or plan may not go our way. But if we can learn to trust in our Lord with all our heart and not depend on our own understanding, we will experience less of the bitterness of failure and more of the grace of God.
Despite the fact that humans exhaust their resources to plot their own paths, it is the Lord who guides their footsteps. Success or failure does not depend upon whether or not we have wisdom, but whether it is God's will. The Lord therefore said that man should not boast of his own wisdom, but rather that he is wise to know God. If God's wisdom is likened to inexhaustible oil, our hearts are then the vessels that hold such oil. To allow His wisdom to fill the vessels, let us empty them of our own will and entrust everything to God wholeheartedly.
|
| |
