independence

Air is a marvelous thing. It carries the life giving oxygen in a mostly benign soup of atmosphere. It flows in and out with the expansion and contraction of my diaphragm usually without conscious thought. How sad it would be if it left. Actually, I would only be sad for a few minutes before the blackness closed over. Air is a thing that although I take it for granted I am absolutely dependent on it.

In general we don’t like to think about the things we are dependent on. When we stop to think it through there are so many of them like water, food, heat, and light that are necessary to life and so many more that make up quality of life like health, love, money, entertainment, education and on and on that it can make you feel a little helpless.

Despite our multitude of dependencies, we have, we all have, an independent streak or at least we like to think that the systems we depend on we also contribute to. Unfortunately most of these systems would be just fine without us.

C.S. Lewis pointed out that in this universe where I find a desire I also find a corresponding answer. Where I hunger, I find food. Where I thirst, I find water. It seems incongruous to say that where I crave independence I find an entirely dependent mechanistic cosmos void of meaning. If independence is required and I don’t find it in myself (and I don’t) it must exist somewhere.

An independent entity would have no prerequisites for its existence. It would not require air or water. It need have no evolutionary ancestor. It would be without beginning because everything that begins has a precursor and this “Beginningless Independence” would not be itself if it had. It would be all-knowing and all powerful, perfect in every way. It would bear a mighty resemblance to God.

If God is the only independent being and I find in myself, highly dependent creature that I am, a need for independence then I conclude that what I seek is God himself.

Given that what I need is God and His independence any activity, attitude, thought or speech whereby I seek to make myself independent without Him is equivalent to seeking to make myself god. This most ancient treachery in many forms is the heritage of the race. Its continued utter failure notwithstanding we fight and we fight to make ourselves the center thus missing out on fulfillment of our basic needs.

I urge you as I urge my own treacherous heart, give yourself over to dependence on Him who alone has true independence and discover that so many idolatrous dependencies fall away like impurities in a furnace.