You want to live utterly reliant on God, but you are unsure what that means. How do you know if you are living dependent on your own strength versus his strength? One quick way to know is to ask yourself, “Do I follow him, even when it doesn’t make sense?”
To be “reliant” on something means you depend upon it. The opposite is self-reliance, meaning I only rely on myself in life. Reliance admits humility, and self-reliance reveals pride.
Jesus modeled a reliant life on the Father.
John 5:19 “So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise.”
DO WE LIVE RELIANT ON GOD?
In 2017, I led a trekking mission trip through the Himalayan mountains of Nepal to tribes located high up in the mountains.
The mission base we were working with said that they felt God leading them to a new unreached people group in a village called Muktinath.
Muktinath translates to the “place of salvation” and contains one of the highest temples in the world (altitude 12,500 ft above sea level!) Buddhists and Hindus treat this area as a holy pilgrimage, believing you must trek there to find salvation.
Muktinath is one of the most challenging places to reach in Nepal, and because it is a holy sight for Buddhists, local missionaries rarely see salvations in this region. Coming from the beach city of San Diego, with no trekking experience, this was an intimidating thing to ask us to do.
Yet when we prayed, we felt like Jesus said, Muktinath is where he wanted to take us.
We had a choice. To follow where God was leading us, on a journey that would require us to become fully God-reliant for strength, strategy, and breakthrough, or stay back and try and find something more manageable to remain self-reliant.
Will we go to a place that seems like a certain defeat in the natural solely because Jesus was saying, “This is where I am going?”
Jesus loves to challenge our self-reliance and call us deeper into trusting and following his guidance.
We said ok, if that’s where Jesus is guiding, that’s where we will be going.
1. Follow Him. No Matter Where He Leads.
In Matthew 15:29, Jesus intentionally goes to a similar, out-of-reach location.
“29: Jesus went on from there and walked beside the Sea of Galilee. And he went up on the mountain and sat down there. And great crowds came to him….”
Notice how great crowds gathered around him? This is interesting because this was not an easy place to gather. Jesus was avoiding the public during this time. He purposefully walked around the opposite side of the Sea of Galilee through a deserted area.
In case that was not deserted enough, he hiked up a mountain and chose to sit down there. In other words, Jesus goes to one of the most hidden, inconvenient places in Israel. He is not making it easy for people to find him.
At THIS location, thousands gather to him! Those who are hungry for God will always find him.
This was not a typical, healthy crowd of people.
“And great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute, and many others, and they put them at his feet, and he healed them….”
This is not a group of healthy, young backpackers excited to attend a conference with Jesus. Thousands of broken, crippled, blind, and mute people are brought by their friends or family members.
Get practical with me.
How do you get a cripple person through the desert and up a mountain? How do you lead a blind guy to hike up a mountain? This wasn’t a pretty sight.
They had to cart, drag, carry, or piggyback ride, disabled people through a desert and up a mountain.
This was not an easy task.
To be crippled back then was almost worse than a death sentence. You’d spend your life begging for pennies, probably homeless. No insurance, no health care. You better hope you have a family to take care of you, or that’s it.
The Pharisees believed God disabled people because of their sins or the sins of their parents.
This was a crowd of outcasts and beggars. These people who can barely survive in a city are willing to take their chances of survival in the desert.
Why? Because that’s where the PRESENCE OF Jesus was. If that is where Jesus is resting, then that is where they want to be.
How do we live reliant on God? Follow his presence, follow his guidance, no matter where it leads.
How desperate are we to set up our lives in a way where his presence is the ultimate destination? Even when it is inconvenient for us, we don’t understand it, and it seems illogical.
Do we hunger more for the presence of Jesus than the comforts of understanding?
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2. Turn your Excuse into a Reason.
We had reasons not to want to do this trek to Muktinath in Nepal. We had valid excuses.
“Jesus, it’s too dangerous.” It was a two-day caravan in Jeeps through the sketchiest roads I’ve ever seen where if the driver goes to the right, we fall down the mountain. Then it’s an intensive two-day hike with 30-50 pounds of gear on our backs, straight up a mountain for 8-10 hours a day. If you get hurt, no ambulance can come.
“Jesus, we don’t have the time” It takes days to get there, and that will take up most of our trip. We could do more work in Kathmandu, where there are ministries, orphanages, and churches we could help.
We had every excuse to get offended with Jesus and say, “Jesus come on, be logical here.”
In Matthew 15, the people who gathered had the best excuse not to go to the desert and climb a mountain to find Jesus. They were crippled, blind, mute, and deaf.
God-Reliant people don’t use their brokenness as excuses for not getting to Jesus but rather as reasons why they must get to Jesus.
If anyone is entitled to stay at home, it’s the guy who can’t walk. If anyone seems entitled to have Jesus come to find them, it’s the blind person.
But instead, these radical, believing people of faith in Jesus said, “I am crippled, and the only answer is to get to that mountain in the desert to find Jesus.”
We all have different handicaps and limitations and have past mistakes, regrets, and sins. We all have excuses in our lives that should disqualify us from following Jesus.
But we have a choice to use these limitations as an excuse not to follow his presence, or we can use the same limitations as a reason why we must get into his presence.
Challenge:
I am asking myself, and I ask you today.
- Do we set up our lives to be fully God-reliant or self-reliant?
- Do we use our limitations as reasons why we cannot follow God or reasons why we must follow God?
- Is any excuse or entitlement keeping me from fully prioritizing obedience to follow Him above all else?
Next post, I will continue the story of the radical miracles and salvations we saw in Muktinath and share how God showed up as I have never seen before.
Loved the story
Wow thank you! God is so good!
Hi Taylor
Thanks for this , I think it is true that God can be difficult to follow. There are so many distractions, so many false unimportant things that we ‘must’ do, things of this world that lead us away from his love, help and forgiveness . Quiet time to think about what he wants us to do, praying for his guidance is so important.
God bless you Taylor.
Michael
So true, putting aside time to be alone with him is so vital to our faith!
This is outstanding, Taylor!
Reminds me of an African outreach I helped lead, driving in a borrowed Jeep through the Mozambique war-zone, to southern impoverished Malawi, in the early 80’s. We stayed in tents in an area where no children or teens had ever seen white people, no fresh water or toilets (we hid behind a bush!) and the kids would come every morning to see us.
We all had to pray individually before going, and get a personal word from God to tell us He wanted us to go. We ALL (8 of us) got that word.
We nearly gave up at a border where the officials wanted to steal our goods and canned food. But GOD told us to carry on and only the Bibles were stolen!
So, it takes love, commitment and obedience and passion for the lost.
I held some womens meetings where they all responded and wanted to be discipled…. The same happened at mens meetings, and childrens meetings.
They even asked us to go back again!
The drive back was safe!
Wow! That is absolutely incredible!! Praise God! Love it!