Allowing God to fight my battles sounds great but it sounds too easy. Do I have any responsibility?

You are correct in thinking that we do have responsibility! But let us remember that man’s part is not always as complex as you might suspect. I think you will find that in most of our dealings with the Lord, there is God’s part working in tandem with man’s part. God does allude to this in 2 Corinthians 6:1 when he says, “As God's fellow workers…”  Having said that, I think you will find that many of our personal battles are really the Lord’s and not ours. This is especially true for those who make it their aim to please Him. Try to imagine a circumstance you have faced when there was little more to do than to “Stand firm and see the deliverance of the Lord” (Exodus 14:13)! But notice, one is still to “stand firm” and “see the deliverance” – which is man’s part.

 

Prior to the Iron Curtain coming down, several friends of mine were part of a ministry that smuggled Bibles into the Soviet Union. The penalty if caught could be imprisonment after a period of torture. Every one of them had some hair-raising experiences at the individual borders. But they also testified of remarkable instances of how God delivered them supernaturally. God would actually make the Bibles invisible to the border guards and other phenomenal things like that. Even in such instances, the individuals had responsibility. They had to be willing to trust God and approach the danger regardless of the price they could have paid. Even though man had a part, it was God who came through big time and his servants could only say, “God won the battle.”

 

Pastor Steve mentioned Jericho as the “Place of Battle” where Elijah returned as he approached being taken to heaven. Part of remembering included the dramatic way in which God brought the walls of Jericho down in the time of Joshua. While God did that difficult part, man’s part was to march around the city seven times, blow the trumpets, and take the city. When you partner with God, your activity will always be associated with demonstrating trust and faith in the Lord. Again, our Pastor told of Naaman going to the Jordan River and dipping seven times – his part – and yet when healed of leprosy, he could only celebrate that God had performed the remarkable cure by Himself. Elijah became part of a drama like that when he struck the water and it parted so he and Elisha could cross the river on dry land. There was again man’s part and then God’s mighty acts.

 

I guess the point is the perspective we use to view the activity of God in our lives while recognizing that man’s part is to trust and obey God.

 

-David Corts