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One of the areas of study I continually come back to is church history. My collection of history books is always growing (partly because there’s always more story to tell). But there are some volumes I keep coming back to. One of those, is Church History in Plain Language.1
Years ago, I remember reading about the events of the Catholic Reformation, itself a response to what we know today as the Protestant Reformation. it was in that era that Ignatius of Loyola founded the society of monks we know today as the Jesuits. Ignatius caught my attention partly because of his evangelistic zeal, and also his devout spiritualism. But for all Ignatius’s zeal and devotion, something about his vision of life struck me as unwittingly hopeless.
I realize that’s a bold claim but stay with me.
Where Do Our Works Belong?
There is arguably no better example of this than in the saying most frequently attributed to Ignatius: “Pray as though everything depended on God alone. But act as though it depended on you alone whether you will be saved.”2
I love the first half of this statement. It is entirely correct. When we pray, especially when we’re praying for someone to be saved, it ought to be with this heart—this commitment everything does indeed depend on God alone. But the second half, that’s where I struggle.
And look, I get it. I’m coming from a different theological framework and conviction than Ignatius. I’m not a Roman Catholic. I do not believe the Bible teaches that the gift of our ongoing justification—our right standing before God—is in any way contingent upon even our most faithfully motivated works. But I also know how we all can get there. After all, as human beings, we’re always seeking to justify ourselves. We want to earn what we cannot. That’s our fallenness at work. All of us are guilty of it.3
Everything Depends on God
But the Scriptures call us to something better because they demonstrate something better. We are meant to not only pray as if everything depends on God. We are to live and act as if everything depends on him, too. Because, guess what? It does. In fact, that’s one of the most consistent themes running throughout the Bible:
- When God called the Israelites to take the Promised Land, for example, it was he that would fight for them (see Deuteronomy 31:8).
- Before David struck down Goliath, he declared that “The Lord will hand you over to me” (1 Samuel 17:46).
- When Paul called the Philippians to obey and work out their own salvation, it was with the knowledge that God was at work within them “both to will and to work according to his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13).
I could list more examples, like 2 Chronicles 20:17, Deuteronomy 20:4, and Isaiah 41:10, but I think you get the idea. And it’s not just in matters of salvation or growing in our faith. Everything depends on God. There is no area of life where we don’t need him. And without him, all is vanity and a striving after the wind.
Because God is at Work, We can Work and Rest
As Christians, we don’t get prayed up and then do everything out of our own effort. (After all, despite what you may have heard, God does not help those who help themselves.) We work, struggle, and strive to grow into the likeness of Christ. And we work to pursue the good of all made in God’s image as ambassadors of Christ’s kingdom. But God is present and working in the work we do. He is not absent. God is before us, in us, and working through us.
And because of that, we can rest. We do not have to strive to earn anything. God does not expect us to pay him back for the salvation he freely gives those who trust in Christ. And God’s kingdom will not fail because we fall short. It does not depend on you. Nor does it depend on me.
It all depends on him. Salvation is of the Lord. He is at work in you, forming you into the image of his Son. He will bring about his kingdom.
So instead of working as though everything depends on us, let’s encourage one another: pray, work, and rest as if everything depends on God. Because it does. And because it does, you can count on God’s purposes in and through you to be completed.
- An earlier version of this article was first published in May 2017. It has been edited for style and content. ↩︎
- I’ve seen this saying periodically attributed to Augustine, but it doesn’t seem to square with what we know of his overall theology. ↩︎
- All this to say, I’m not bashing the Roman Catholics or setting up strawmen here. ↩︎
Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash
