Reflections: Where Does Your Power Come From?

Sometimes, you hear the charge that the COGs teach that you earn your own salvation.  In other words, it is alleged that your own efforts get you into the Kingdom.  Not only is that a distortion of what is taught, it is a downright false idea which is believed by no one I’ve ever met.

In the past, I have used the example of a person drowning.  Perhaps I can save you by throwing you a life preserver.  You had nothing to do with whether or not I threw it to you.  You didn’t do something to earn me throwing you a safety line with a floating device on the end.  It was a free gift.

But, what if you don’t grab hold of it?  Will you be saved?  Most likely not.  If you do grab hold of it, would you claim that you were saved by your own power because you grabbed ahold of the life preserver?  Only the really arrogant would do such a thing, it seems to me.

In the case of God, however, it goes even deeper than that.  What if you were an android instead of a human being and I were your inventor?  I would have given you the ability to even grab ahold of the life preserver.  I would have designed the joints and bearings that create motion and the appendages that can grab.  Now, how much credit would you get for “your efforts”?

In the case of God, again, even that isn’t deep enough.  If I designed you as an android, then I also made the plans for your construction.  If I didn’t manufacture the parts myself, I drew up the designs for someone else to do so.  Even the materials that were used in your manufacture would have been designated in your design.

Yet, once again, that analogy falls far short, doesn’t it?   After all, God created everything there is – from nothing!  There is no analogy for that.  However, there is an old joke that tells it like it is:

In the year 2020, science has advanced to the point that human cloning is now passé.  Artificial life was now a reality.  And, so now science felt that they could challenge God to making an entire human being from scratch.  “OK,” God said, “Let’s have this little contest of yours.  You and I will make a human being from scratch, only you have to do it just like I do.”

“Agreed,” says the top scientist.  He then reaches down to pick up a handful of dirt.

“No,” says God.  “I do it from nothing.  Now, go make your own dirt.”

What do we bring to the table?  Nothing.  We are dirt, and we came from nothing until God created everything.

However, God wants us to be part of His family.  From nothing to God-plan existence!  So, what does this mean?  It means we have to want and strive to be like God.  We have to grab ahold of that life preserver in order to be saved, literally.  The alternative is the second death.

God gives us His Holy Spirit in order to give us the strength to hang on.  It is true that He steps in where we fail.  Our power alone cannot save us at all, and even if it by chance were able to, it would not matter, for where did the power come from to begin with?

No matter how you look at it, it is from God.

 ¹¹Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day:

 ¹²Lest when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt therein;

 ¹³And when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied;

 ¹⁴Then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage;

 ¹⁵Who led thee through that great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water; who brought thee forth water out of the rock of flint;

 ¹⁶Who fed thee in the wilderness with manna, which thy fathers knew not, that he might humble thee, and that he might prove thee, to do thee good at thy latter end;

 ¹⁷And thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth.

 ¹⁸But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day. (Deuteronomy 8:11-18, King James Version)

Is it any wonder that we see in Revelation and elsewhere that all glory and honor is given to God?

 ¹⁰The four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying,

 ¹¹Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created. (Revelation 4:10-11, King James Version)