I Can't But God Can

 I Can’t But God Can

These are familiar words for many of us:

1. We admitted we were powerless over our dependency and that our life had become unmanageable. 

2. We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. 

3. We turned our will and our life over to the care of God as we understood Him. 

In shorter terms it’s: “I can’t.  God can.  I’ll let Him.”

It just that stop and take a breath moment where we remind ourselves, in God’s presence, that we can’t do life on our own and that God is with us to do what is necessary.  That all important part of the equation though, the turning of our will and this situation over to God and trusting in His care – that’s often the toughest part.

Jesus bumped into a broken down woman one day by a well when He was passing through the area where she lived.  She’s a woman of ill repute and in the course of His conversation with her, Jesus let’s her know that He knows all about how chaotic and unmanageable her life has been and how she is powerless to fix herself. 

He offers her the only solution to her problem – life through Him.  It’s as they converse that she comes to believe that Jesus really is a power greater than herself

and that His love and forgiveness and acceptance could make her whole.

Her response?  She runs back to the village where people looked at her with shame and said this:

Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ? Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.”  John 4:29, 39,

When God forgives us He also heals us from the inside out.  Shame and guilt go and hope for a new life grows. There’s freedom and joy like we’ve never known.  That’s something to share with others – even those who have looked down on us previously.

Heavenly Father, Lord, tell us about our past from Your perspective.  We need to hear the truth but hear it within Your voice of love and grace.  Hold us close to Your heart while You reveal our true selves to us and do Your work of saving, healing, and transforming in us. 

We believe that there is something about the reality of Your grace in our personal stories of transformation that wakes others up and provides an opportunity for them to encounter Your love as well. 

God, we can’t.  You can.  Today we will let You.  Amen

Whatever our story looks like – a person beaten down by failures or someone desperately playing the hiding game, let’s admit today that our lives are broken and come to Jesus to get sorted out.  What a day we can have living in God’s forgiveness.