The Partnership

Darline and I love to sit out on our patio. Sitting there, we’re surrounded by beauty. The hibiscus plants are beginning to bloom, the banana palm is thriving, and all the other colorful flowers combine with the singing of the birds to produce a relaxing and tranquil setting. All of the beauty we are now enjoying took quite a bit of work. But it was pretty simple. If you till the soil, plant the seed, and water it, God takes care of the hard part. He works through the miracle of the seed, the soil, the sun, and the season to produce the flower. Making a garden is a partnership between you and God.

The same process applies not just to gardens. All of life is a miracle. A person’s life can be a thing of beauty. A person’s life can be like a beautiful garden, touching and enhancing the lives of others. But a beautiful, purposeful, useful, productive, powerful life doesn’t just happen. It takes both the miracle touch of God, and it takes the honest effort of the person.

Life is a combination of the miraculous and the mundane. Guess which part God takes care of? Right… the miraculous. Guess what happens when we take care of the mundane? God can work miracles. God says, “You plant the seed, I’ll grow the tree.” “You supply the effort, I’ll work the miracle.”

It is true, you can’t have a garden without God’s miracle of the seed, the sun, the soil, and the seasons. But for some reason God has set it up so that He can’t have a beautiful garden without our part of the equation either.

God has designed life to be a partnership. God will do His part, but you have to do yours too. God has set up the universe in such a way that we can partner with him to produce a beautiful world. If we’ll make the effort, God will work the miracle. That’s the deal. It takes both. God offers to partner with you in creating a miracle in your life. You supply the work; God will supply the miracle.

But guess what… If you don’t plant the seed, you get no tree. If you don’t engage in the effort, you get no miracle. The effort, the work, is what we call personal development. It’s taking the life that you have been given and seeing what you and God can make out of it. Our part in personal development is the effort part of the equation. We can’t sit around expecting God to work a miracle in our lives if we’re not willing to do our part. The books, classes, seminars, libraries, bookstores, and sermons, are all within your reach. So why is it so many people don’t get the miracle? It’s because they haven’t put in the effort.

Personal development is working in partnership with God to discover and become the person God wants you to be. It is reaching toward your full potential.

God has never had an opportunity like you. He wants to work your miracle. You can’t get from point A (where you are) to point B (where you want to be) without God’s help. But neither can you get from point A to point B without supplying your part. It is only when you, through your own effort, engage in the disciplines necessary to give direction to the miracle of God in your life that your life will explode into increase, abundance and purpose.

James says that if you’ll move toward God, that he will move toward you. Personal development is seeing how much you can learn, do, become, and give. It is about increasing your value to God, to others, and to yourself. What will happen if you invest the effort? I’m telling you that you and God, working together, can produce a miracle in your life! It’s a partnership!