By Jessica Brodie

When my daughter was little, she went through a phase where her favorite phrase was “I do.”

I’d go to put socks on her and she’d snatch them out of my hands. “I do!”

I’d start to pour Cheerios in her bowl and she’d reach for the box. “I do!”

I’d start to click the latch on her booster seat in the car and she’d put her little hand on mine. “I do!”

We all go through that, don’t we? We want to do for ourselves. We want to provide and work hard and strive and have the satisfaction of knowing that we are independent and strong and fierce and capable. It’s our adult version of “I do!”

If there’s a sin I struggle with, it’s probably pride—pride that I can do something on my own. Pride that I don’t need someone’s help. Pride that I can make it happen, thank you very much.

Except there’s really no room for pride in the Christian life, is there?

In John 15, Jesus talks about how he is the vine and we are the branches, that apart from him we can do nothing. In Philippians 4:13, the apostle Paul says he has discovered the secret to being content in all things and that is knowing that he can do all things in the Lord who gives him the strength.

Sometimes we focus on the first half of that verse—the notion that “I can do all things.” But it’s the second half of the verse that really matters. The truth is that we can’t do all things on our own. We’re not meant to do all things on our own. Did I make the world or the sunrise, the birds nestled in the trees above me? The water at my feet? Likewise, why do I think I must do for myself? Why does my refrain sound an awful a lot like my three-year-old daughter’s—“I do”?

Recently, I battled a time of stress and overwhelm that became debilitating. I took on too many projects, thinking I’d mapped out my time management just fine. Except … well … the first project deadline was contingent on some other deadline being met, and that deadline was delayed by circumstances beyond my control. Then another circumstance beyond my control delayed another project. Consequently, I found myself in one month having to tackle so many projects I couldn’t even remember how many balls were in the air. I was juggling as fast and as hard as I could, yet I couldn’t keep up.

In one week I had four different people look me in the eye and tell me God had put me on their heart to pray for, and they were worried about my stress load.

That day, I began praying to God daily for his help in my overwhelm: “I can’t do this on my own. Please give me the supernatural strength that only comes from you in order to get through today.” By “supernatural,” I mean divine—God strength. The kind of strength I can’t possibly have on my own.

God met my needs that day. The next day I prayed the same, and he met my needs once again.

I’m still digging out from that stress hole, but it’s no longer a bottomless it. There’s light at the end of the tunnel, and when I finally emerge, I’ll know it wasn’t because of my strength, but because of God.

I’ve found in my life that God teaches this over and over—we humans weren’t meant to be self-sustaining. We were meant to be connected to the ultimate power source, the Lord. In the Garden of Eden, we were meant to be in perfect relationship with God, but we broke away and did what we wanted to do instead. We listened to our internal “I do” instead of relying on the Lord.

We human beings have kept doing that long after the time of the garden. We think we’re supposed to stand on our own feet, and we listen to these rules society has come up with and think as adults we’re not supposed to need someone else to walk beside us and fix our problems. We’re supposed to be capable and independent.

Except it’s a mess. It’s a lie. Yes, we’re supposed to leave our parents and start families of our own, and eventually care for the same parents who raised us up. But it doesn’t mean we’re supposed to do it all by ourselves. It never did.

If you are like me and have a tendency to think the responsibilities of the world rest clearly on your shoulders, think again. You are not the savior of the world. Jesus is.

And we never walk alone.

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Come hang out with me!

If you live anywhere near Charlotte/Rock Hill, I’ll be at the Fort Mill Public Library in South Carolina April 18 from 10-12 for a free Carolina Christian book event . Come see me! You’ll be able to meet and chat with Christian authors, buy books, meet other Christian readers, and have some fun. Authors in addition to me are Robert Whitlow, Misty M. Beller, Vincent B. Davis II, E.V. Sparrow, Pamela Lewis, Dianne Miley, Jennifer Chastain, Seralynn Lewis, Kyle Hunter, Tim Eichenbrenner, Janice Cole Hopkins, Heidi Gray McGill, and Katherine Pasour, plus The Wandering Words and Sparkler Magazine.

Big news!

I’m honored to announce both of my books are finalists in the prestigious Selah Awards, with winners to be announced in May! The Memory Garden is a finalist in the Contemporary Women’s Fiction category, while Tangled Roots is a finalist in both the General Fiction and the Audiobook categories. What an honor! I hope you’ll read them. Click here to learn more and buy the books.