Trust vs. Trying

Ron Block is a musician with Alison Krauss and Union Station. He wrote the following brief--but poignant--expose of the "trying" kind of life that has nothing to do with Christ:

"'You should at least be trying!' I’ve heard that one many times.

"Strife isn’t wasted. I used to think George MacDonald legalistic. But as I grew I realized that all his talk about obedience was to drive us to the source of ability to obey--Christ Himself. All that legalism becomes a powerful engine as we come down to that crucial point of honesty with ourselves: 'I cannot be "like Christ" in any way, shape, or form by this rule-keeping method.'

"I hated the word 'obedience' for years because I feared it; I knew I couldn’t measure up. Now I know that real obedience is 'the obedience of faith'; that is, the obedience that springs from reliance or trust in Jesus Christ. I trust, and obedience follows. If obedience doesn’t follow, I’m not trusting. It really comes down to something as simple as that.

"Faith in Christ--the grabbing-hold-of-God’s-promises kind of faith--produces obedience. Intellectual assent to certain ideas about Christ can’t save or sanctify anyone. Faith is the open heart toward God which allows Him full rein (and reign) of the human vessel; horse and rider can move as one if the horse trusts the rider and moves with the rider’s purposes; the horse, if well-trained, feels the rider’s every movement. The horse, with a willing cooperation in faith with the rider, can then move to a much higher level of purpose and meaning in his horse-universe than if he were just roaming aimlessly wherever he felt like going and getting fat eating all the rich grass."