Orange Moon Wednesday, October 29, 2025 "Nothing"

The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…

"Nothing"    

       

   "Without Me, ye can do nothing" (John 15:5).  Nothing?

    What did the Lord Jesus Christ mean by His blanket declaration of our inability, and the implied promise of His enabling?

    First, the context of His statement suggests He referred to His disciple's need for grace regarding their walk with God.  Apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, such a walk could not have begun apart from the new birth He makes possible and actual in all who believe.  Without Him, we cannot begin with God.  

    He also meant that we require His ongoing imparting of grace for the life to which He calls us after we believe.  "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him" (Colossians 2:6).  We can no more "continue in the faith" apart from the Lord Jesus than we could have been birthed into the faith by our own devices (Colossians 1:23).  Without Him, we can have no walk with God.

   Interestingly, however, the truth of "without Me, ye can do nothing" applies in more general terms, regarding both believer and unbeliever alike.  Who among us made ourselves?  Nary a one.  "It is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves" (Psalm 100:3).  The most devoted believer and the most strident atheist required the Lord Jesus for existence.

   The need continues.  "In Him we live and move and have our being… He giveth to all life and breath and all things" (Acts 17; 25; 28).  Human beings do not and cannot sustain ourselves.  We require our Creator's ongoing administration of "life and breath and all things."  We may respond to such enabling in faith or unbelief, but the truth remains that if God withholds His gift of life, we will "do nothing."

   This raises a fascinating point regarding those who do not believe.  They require the Lord's provision of their existence in order to live in unbelief.  This includes their sins (and also the sins committed by believers).  No one could distrust and disobey God if He did not will the continuance of their lives.  The atheist requires the breath the Lord gives in order to declare, "I do not believe in You!"  Of course, this in no way suggests He wills or causes their sins, a moral impossibility.  James clearly declares that God does not even tempt to sin, much less determine it (James 1:13).  It does mean that our human "can do nothing" is far more abject and comprehensive - and mysterious - than we often consider.  

    Regarding the Christian life, the revelation of our need continues.

     "If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness.  But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you" (Romans 8:10-11).

   Our human members and faculties remain in "death" even after our spirits are born again through the new birth.  By this, Paul means they do not yet dwell in the direct presence of God, as do our spirits united to the Spirit of Christ (I Corinthians 15:53:54; Galatians 4:6).  Thus, they require the enlivening of the Holy Spirit regarding every act of faith and faithfulness.  We play a role in the relationship, trusting in "Christ, the power of God," and acknowledging our utter inability apart from Him (I Corinthians 1:24).  Never, however, do we believe ourselves as having been strong in ourselves as we trust and obey, but rather "strong in the Lord and in the power of His might" (Ephesians 6:10).

    The Psalmist prayed a wise and sublime prayer in this regard: "Lord, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days, what it is; that I may know how frail I am" (Psalm 39:4).  How frail?  "Without Me, ye can do nothing."

He lives in us, the hope of glory,

to write upon our hearts the story

of Heaven dwelling in earthly frame

for those who trust and bear His Name.

Nothing without Him, all things through Him,

this is the life we live,

in the Christ dwells within,

God's grace He ever gives.

"We also are weak in Him, but we shall live with Him by the power of God."

(II Corinthians 13:4)

 

Weekly Memory Verse

   Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Spirit."

(Titus 3:5)

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