The Christian's Response-ability 
By Mike Rule

There is great confusion among us as Christians over what is our responsibility and what is God's. This often leads to contention and strife among believers. Somehow we have lost sight of the person of Jesus Christ and are chasing after a different form of good news, which is really not good news at all. It is amazing that we are so quick to desert the person of Jesus Christ and settle for a result-driven religion (see Galatians 1). Is it really good news that we have found the freedom of God by accepting the Lord Jesus, but now we must work hard to keep an almost impossible set of rules to grow in that relationship with Him?

Being results-driven is dangerous because we are demanding a sign of God's work in people's lives. This is not walking in faith, but in sight. Is it likely that Jesus came to dwell in you to make your life miserable by assigning a totally impossible list of things for you to do? Of course there will be results, but they will be God-generated and not accomplished by human effort. God only gave us one responsibility as His children. Our responsibility is our response-ability. Faith does not generate God's work, but receives the things of God and responds to what He is revealing. That is the simplicity of being a Christian. Paul said it clearly in Galatians 5: the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.

In a similar fashion in which a baby is conceived, so also a person receives the Lord. Through intimacy something is conceived that takes time to mature. When a woman gives birth before the completion of her third trimester a healthy child is not usually the result. I fear we are often so desperate to see others give birth that we get things all out of order and are preaching a different Gospel than Christ. The point of the gospel is the intimacy. 

"⁶In this you greatly rejoice… ⁷that the genuineness of your faith…may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, ⁸whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, ⁹receiving the end of your faith-the salvation of your souls." (1 Peter 1:6-9) 

Our only responsibility as God's children is our willingness to receive the things of God, and respond to Him in faith. That is our response-ability. As Hannah Whitall Smith said, "…man's part is to trust and God's part is to work." Are you willing to trust Him no matter what it looks like and respond to what you sense Him doing, even if it means waiting upon Him while doing nothing for the moment?