Does God Intervene In Our Lives?

Through the process of deconstruction, I’ve abandoned numerous harmful ideas about God, but there are many beliefs I hold to as tightly as ever. When it comes to the intervention of God, I perceive a pressure to join the throng who no longer believe God gets involved in our lives, but I can’t go there with my integrity intact, because it would mean denying my own story. It would be like willingly sacrificing my sight. 

Experience has taught me that God does answer prayer. For example, he helped me escape the torment of mental ill health in my mid-twenties. Over the years, he’s provided for me in a host of different ways, even when it looked like there was no way forward. In a previous article, I shared the first-hand account of an occasion when the Lord powerfully intervened in the lives of a young couple in a crisis, and in another, the story of my friend Mick finding his way out of the deepest emotional pit. 

Personally, I believe God is actively involved in our lives and would love to be even more so, but it’s up to us to allow him to move. In this article, I want to identify several ways in which we restrict his freedom to intervene:

Confusion about the nature of God

Many believers are taught that God is both the author of blessing and suffering, but that kind of faith is double-minded, hobbling the feet of every person who buys into it. I was brought up in a conservative Evangelical church where, instead of focussing on the nature of Jesus as a healer, we shared stories of sickness and suffering as prime examples of God at work. Take the story of Joni Eareckson, a young woman who was paralysed in a swimming accident in North America. In her biography, she describes the process of accepting her life-long disability as God’s will. The lesson she is trying to communicate is that even though God brings hardship into our lives, he will ultimately make something beautiful out of it. I have no wish to speak ill of a courageous person, and do not doubt her intentions, but unfortunately, this kind of dogma inflicts grievous harm. 

Joni Eareckson is practically revered by the Evangelical movement, who offer adulation to anyone who accepts suffering as God’s will for their life, but I do not believe that God is glorified by these stories. The glory goes to the individual who bravely declares their acceptance of suffering and continues to believe, rather than to God, who seems to be conspicuously absent.

According to James, a person who is confused about the nature of God has zero chance of receiving from the Lord. For those who want to dig more deeply into this, I covered the subject in a previous article.

Lacking a pilgrim mindset

 

Authentic spirituality is never inert. It does not build a fortress and hunker down, never to move again. I firmly believe that an active relationship with the Holy Spirit always leads to a spiritual experience of continual growth and change. 

When Jesus declared ‘It is finished!’, he wasn’t telling us that growth is over. I understand that many have been burned out by religion, where ‘spiritual growth’ was imposed as a man-made construct, but a commitment to growth is entirely different once you’ve embraced your identity in Christ. What once felt like drudgery is replaced by organic, Spirit-led development. There’s no compulsion; only empowerment. 

I celebrate the vibrant energy of every person who understands that we are in a permanent state of transition.

 

Neglecting our union with Jesus

 

Union was Jesus’ ultimate aim for his disciples and for the entire human race. When he was about to be arrested and crucified, he expressed his deepest wish for us in prayer. John 18:20b-26,

 

“I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you…I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity…I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”

Union is also the end goal of the Gospel. Ephesians 1:8b-10,

 

With all wisdom and understanding, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfilment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.

It’s entirely possible to call oneself a Christian and do little or nothing to explore and deepen the union we are called to live in as a daily reality. It’s important to understand that the union is already established, and that we have all we need for life and godliness in our spirits, but the gift still needs to be unpacked. I’m grateful for the deep connection with the Spirit of God I know on a daily basis and am committed to exploring the package of blessings imbued in my spirit. 

Disbelieving Jesus

 

I understand that the idea of ‘walking in faith’ has been abused, pressuring people to receive something from God through endless declarations. Despite the unhelpful behaviour of others, I still choose to believe what God has promised, no matter what. I don’t feel the need to stomp and shout or name and claim, but in my heart of hearts, I know that God can be trusted. For example, when Jesus said he would provide for us, he wasn’t lying. Matthew 26:25-34,

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

…So do not worry, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.”

I can honestly say that in all my years of walking with God, he has never let me down, even when I couldn’t see where help might come from. Choosing to believe what Jesus has promised opens the door for divine intervention.

Committing to a life of growth

 

How do we enter the flow of organic spiritual development? The answer is simple - by spending time with God, deepening our relationship with the Holy Spirit and receiving his love for ourselves. Intimacy with God is the bedrock of spiritual growth. Jesus began his days with time alone with his father, drawing the love and strength he needed, so why should we be any different?

 

If we are committed to walking more closely from God, learning to hear his voice, and yielding to the tangible flow of his love, we have more to give to our loved ones and neighbours. When we are saturated with divine love, we see others with the eyes of God.