Stop limiting God!

Have small thoughts about yourself, but great thoughts about God and about His work with you! Because He is a very great and good and capable Master! He creates an amazing work even out of very weak subjects!

Stop limiting God!

You are committing a disastrous mistake when you think it is virtuous to believe that God cannot do much in and through you. You are mistaking God for yourself. Instead of thinking lowly thoughts about yourself, you think lowly thoughts about God, which is something totally different from virtue!

If we were to carry out the work ourselves, it would be absolutely right to think that way. But we cannot make a bigger mistake! It is He Himself—the unspeakably great and good Master— who will carry out the work. And He can.

“Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.” Psalm 37:5. “He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it.” 1 Thessalonians 5:24.

Believe in God as He is!

We can say that the most difficult thing of all is to believe that God is as good as He really is. We have no problem believing that God is good and that He is so good as to forgive us our sins; but to believe that He is so abundantly good that He will let us partake of His own divine nature, that He will make us more than conquerors over every imaginable sin, etc., etc., and also use us and entrust us with great things, that is very difficult to believe. But what are we to do? Believe the Scriptures! Believe the promises! For example: Colossians 1:28; Colossians 1:11; Colossians 1:22; Philippians 4:13; Philippians 4:19; Philippians 2:15; Philippians 1:6; Ephesians 6:13; Ephesians 1:19; Ephesians 2:6-7; Ephesians 3:19-20.

Let us stop at this last verse: “That you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” Yes, who believes that God both can and will do such great things? Are you tempted to think that to believe such a thing is to be proud? In other words, thinking that having great thoughts about God’s goodness and His power is to be proud? Or that having lowly thoughts about God is to be humble?

No—then you are getting it all mixed up, so you are mistaking God’s work for your own work. Correct this way of thinking!

This article has been translated from Norwegian and was first published under the title “Have small thoughts about yourself, but great thoughts about God and about His work with you!” in BCC’s periodical Skjulte Skatter (Hidden Treasures) in April 1951.
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