We always have some sort of evaluation of ourselves. We also have some sort of criteria for that evaluation. This criteria is used by us to decide whether or not we are qualified to do certain things. God has a different set of rules for evaluating us. We can feel we are ready to win in a certain area of life and God can completely disagree. We can feel we are ready to lose at some assignment and God can know we are ready to win. The system that God uses to evaluate us has to do with dependency.

When Moses was evaluating himself as a deliverer of God’s people, he was depending on his own abilities and strength. Once he found out he wasn’t their answer, he lost all dependency. He felt he had no one to depend on for helping hurting people. That attitude was one step closer to winning at life than Moses had been before. As long as we have ourselves to depend on, there is no room for God. Once we lose all dependency, there is a hole, an empty space for God to fill.

We don’t have to be emptied of our dependency in ourselves to be filled with God’s power. We don’t have to go through all the self-doubt, pessimism, depression, helpless and hopeless feelings, and emptiness to move into God-confidence. Just like light drives out darkness, God can crowd out our dependency on ourselves as we read, study, and pray. He can move a dependency in Himself into us and gradually drive out our trust and reliance on ourselves. This is the best way to gain God-confidence. That is why we are spending all this time in God’s Word during these devotions. This exposure to God and His Word progressively crowds out our dependency on ourselves and builds our faith and trust in God and His power.

Pray that Jesus will help you trade your dependency on yourself for a dependency in God and His Word. Ask Him to keep you from having to learn the hard way that self-confidence won’t work. Ask Him to heal you in any areas where you have no confidence. Pray that He will fill those empty areas with His love, presence, and power. Let Him be the One you always depend on.