We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; in deed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul ... if there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.

Wednesday, February 11, 2015

Christ said, Without me ye can do nothing



“I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abitheth in me, and I in him the same bringeth forth much fruit for without me ye can do nothing.” (John 15:5)
Heavenly Father then would be the root, Christ is the vine, his apostles are the branches and I am just a little twig on one of the branches, but I’m growing. Sometimes we get stunted in our growth for one reason or the other. The problem with most analogies is that they are not true comparisons and this is no exception. If a branch or a twig gets stunted, broken off, too much shade, or so on the twig has no recourse. We on the other hand can choose to accept the gospel or to wander in unclean places.It reminds me of the twelve step program that says we are powerless over our addictions and that only a higher power can help us overcome them.
I think of a recent talk I heard that asked the question, are we acting on or being acted upon. It went into a lot of human nature things that affect marketing. Why we buy the things we do and why we do the things we do (our self defeating behavior.)   Our speaker Joseph Grenny who has written a motivational book called “You Can Change Anything” says we can only control our behavior by “taking control of the things that control us.”  Which goes back to which power are we looking to for help?

No comments: