Christ, the Sustainer

"Let me do it." "I can do it myself!" Little children say phrases like these very often. We chuckle at their want of independence at a very dependent age. Christians are often like that. Especially "old" Christians - the ones who have believed the scriptures all their life, gone to church, and read the Bible over and over again. You get caught up in what you are doing and so lose sight of what Christ is doing. We want to fling our actions back in God's face and say, "See? I'm righteous! I did it, and I did it without your help. I've become independent!" In reality we're quite the opposite. As sinners we cannot hope to ever become independent. To say we are is to contradict all that the Bible says about us and our nature. If we could somehow make ourselves look good in the eyes of God, if we could fix all of our sins and brokenness, why do we need Christ? If we can somehow make it right, why did He die? It twists the gospel to say that we can somehow save ourselves through our works.

All we need to do is look at the world to see that this is not the case. We see our failures played out in our lives so vividly it hurts. Our sin pushes itself to the forefront of our minds as we watch ourselves hurt our siblings and friends, dishonor our parents, shirk our duties. People are not perfect. They can never attain perfection by themselves. If they could they would not need Christ. Adam would not have succumbed to temptation. Jesus Christ would not have to have died.

He did die. He needed to die, because we are wretchedly sinful beings. We fail every day. We look at our lives and are filled with despair because we cannot do it alone. We feel inadequate, full of despair, because we cannot fix it. We feel useless. That is right where we need to be in order to receive the gospel. The Bible isn't about us - if anything it shows us our failings - it is about Christ. It is through His work and sacrifice that we do anything right.