Then they were quite willing and glad for Him to come into the boat. – John 6:21, Amplified Bible

We make the Christian life harder than it needs to be.

In John 6, Jesus had just finished feeding the five thousand. In order to avoid being seized and made king after this miracle, Jesus withdrew Himself to the hillside to be alone for awhile. When evening came, the disciples took it upon themselves to cross the sea to Capernaum, not waiting for Jesus before they did so. While in the boat, the sea became tempestuous and violent, blowing them to and fro. After rowing only three to four miles – basically getting nowhere under their own power – Jesus came to them walking on the water and joined them in the boat. Upon Christ’s arrival, the Bible records that:

…now the boat went at once to the land they had steered toward. [And immediately they reached the shore toward which they had been slowly making their way.] – John 6:21, Amplified Bible

Once Christ arrived and took over as “captain of the ship,” the task that the disciples could not accomplish alone became easy.

In our daily work for Christ, we are prone to act ahead of God’s timing and in our own power. When we do so, we usually encounter resistance along the path – even when the path we are pursuing is the path that we know, without a shadow of a doubt, is the path that He has placed us on. The path would be so much easier to travel if we would simply wait on Christ to join us along the way. When we wait for God’s timing and when we defer to God’s power, God will enable us to accomplish the work that he has fitted us for. If we act in our own timing and in our own power, then we will face resistance that we cannot overcome.

Due to our human frailties, we will regularly make the mistake of acting on our own without God. But when we recognize that we’ve done this, we should immediately repent, take ourselves out of God’s place, and restore Him to the throne of our lives where He belongs. Failing to do so will invite prolonged difficulty into our lives that just doesn’t need to be there.