Dependency

I woke up this morning with a headache, a sore throat, and a runny nose. Bah. As someone who gets sicks fairly easily, I'm not too surprised that I'm once again, sick. I quickly stepped into the shower, since it's already 9.50am and I gotta make class soon. In the shower, I found myself complaining to God and praying that I would get healed and hopefully be strengthened so that I don't get sick as easily! Sounds reasonable. Nothing I haven't prayed for before.

Yet, as I stepped out of the house, the Lord's prayer rang in my mind.

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

- Matthew 6.9b-13

I realized that Christ did not ask for strength. He asked for dependency. A handful of praise. Receiving our nutrient from God. Forgiven our debtors...but Christ didn't ask for strength here. It sounds like the prayer already assumes we have the ability to do it. Temptation...that too, is a dependency statement. The Lord's prayer is one of dependency...

Wait. Does that mean that my prayer this morning for stronger immune system was bad?

A bit of thoughts got me...it's not wrong to ask for strength. In fact, Joshua 1 shows God commanding Joshua to be brave and courageous (and the best way for Joshua to get that is via God...). Judges 16 shows Samson asking for physical strength to defeat his enemies. It's not wrong to be asking for supplication. Moses and Jeremiah both asked for strength/words/etc to perform their respective ministries. But just a quick reminder that my strengths and weaknesses (as much as it seems like it sometimes, I don't imagine God in Heaven to be like..."oh crap, I screwed Jon's immune systems. Oops.") are designed and anticipated (Though, I'm hard-pressed to figure out how I'd possibly benefit from having a crappy immune system...except maybe to be reminded that I need God. =P), and that I'm called to be dependent on God. A lesson I forget much too often. Pride does that.

Then I got a sudden urge to blog about it. So here it is. Haha.