the chase

Maybe you don't live on a farm. Maybe you've never even been to one. But you should be able to get this analogy.

Farmers work hard without knowing how things will turn out. A farmer plows his field, plants seeds, fertilises, and gets rid of weeds that can kill healthy crops - but in the end he completely depends on forces outside himself. He knows he can't cause the seed to start growing. He can't make it rain. He can't force the sun to shine at just the right times for growing and harvesting the crop. To be a successful farmer and businessman, he totally depends on God for all these things to take place.

Yet if the farmer doesn't do everything he needs to do - plow, plant, fertilise, and cultivate - he can't expect a harvest at the end of the season. He's in sort of a partnership with God. The farmer has a chance of benefitting only when he has fulfilled his own responsibilities.

Farming is a joint venture between God and the farmer. The farmer can't do what God must do, and God won't do what the farmer is responsible for.

Chasing after holiness is like that. Holiness is something we need God to do, yet on the flip side we need to do some of the work ourselves. If God isn't present, true holiness can't be present. Yet if we rely solely on God and don't put any effort into it ourselves, holiness isn't possible either.

God has marked out the path for us to run down, but he's given us the responsibility of the chase. We have to do the running ourselves.

- Jerry Bridges, The Chase

"Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labour in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain." - Psalm 127:1 (NIV)

"What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe - as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow." - 1 Corinthians 3:5-7 (NIV)

God is responsible when we choose to do good, and we are responsible when we choose not to do good.

however, that 'God is responsible when we choose to do good' does not mean that 'God is responsible for us choosing to do good'. God is not responsible for us choosing to do good - we are responsible for us choosing to do good. this is why we are responsible when we choose not to do good.

rather, that 'God is responsible when we choose to do good' means that 'in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose' (Romans 8:28, NIV).

"Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed - not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence - continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose." - Philippians 2:12-13 (NIV)

God works in us in the sense that He gives us life, not in the sense that He forces us to live!