The Impossible Work

In our home, if we don’t make peanut butter ourselves, we buy natural peanut butter. But one drawback with natural peanut butter is that because the oil and the peanuts separate, they have to be mixed together.

I don’t know anyone who enjoys that job.

My shortcut is to empty the contents of the jar into a bowl, mix it in the bowl and return it mixed into the jar. It’s much easier than mixing it in the jar. While visiting my wife’s parents, I saw something that could be a peanut butter game changer.

My mother-in-law was using a device that screws onto the top of the peanut butter jar and mixes the peanut butter while it is still in the jar.

The hard work is done by the device.

A difficult task is made simple.

There is some hard work involved in Christianity.

Denying self isn’t an easy matter.

There is a reason Jesus encouraged us to “strive to enter through the narrow gate” (Luke 13:24). Revelation says we are in a war against the devil himself (Revelation 12:17), while Paul used military imagery when urging us to “put on the whole armor of God” (Ephesians 6:11). The work of resisting temptation and living a new life in Christ is not a work that we alone can successfully accomplish.

What is needed is the presence and power of God. Knowing this, Paul reminded the Philippian church “that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.” The hard work —the humanly impossible work— of changing the heart and of successfully repelling temptation is done by Jesus.

You are promised that the One who began the work —who called you to repentance and touched your heart with the love of God— will carry the life-changing work being done in you through to completion. We have been provided with unlimited spiritual power in Jesus. Surrendering to His presence assures you of a finished work in your life.