Everyone Is Dependent—On God

By Roshel

She was having lunch at a friend’s house when the conversation turned to a charitable home for the elderly. Her friend was thinking of sending them some provisions in memory of her deceased father on the occasion of his death anniversary.

“That’s a really good idea,” she said to her.

“But it’s horrible to live like that,” her friend’s husband butted in rather unexpectedly.

“Live like what?” she asked, piqued at what she thought was a very foolish comment.

“I mean, it’s horrible to be dependent on others—for food, clothes, a roof over one’s head and things like that,” he replied.

“But we are all dependent that way, aren’t we?” she retorted, rather curtly.

He looked puzzled, indicating that he wanted her to explain.

“Yes, of course we are,” she continued. “We are all dependent—on God—whether or not we care to recognize the fact, and not just for food, clothes and a roof over one’s head but for everything else.”

He smiled and hurriedly changed the topic.

*

No matter how ‘independent’, ‘self-dependent’, or ‘self-made’ we may fancy ourselves to be, the fact of the matter is that, at a very fundamental level, all of us are dependent on God for every single thing that we have or avail of. No one is an exception to this rule.

Take the hypothetical case of a billionaire who was born in an impoverished family. He revels in talking about what he calls ‘the most amazing rags-to-riches story ever’. He regards himself as a ‘self-made’ person and thinks that he has managed to get where he is entirely by his own efforts. He prides himself in being ‘independent’.

Now, while he may not be dependent on any other human being financially or even emotionally, is it really true that he is as independent and self-made as he imagines he is?

No, not at all!

Consider some basic facts:

The very body that he inhabits (with its approximately 30 trillion cells, each of which perhaps contains some 100 trillion atoms), wasn’t made by him. The various sense organs that his body possesses through which he is able to carry out his business weren’t made by him either. The great variety of food items that he eats—none of these was invented by him. The sand and stones that went into making the mansion where he lives weren’t made by him, nor were the minerals and various chemical compounds that went into making the fleet of vehicles that he owns. The law of gravity that makes it possible for him to be rooted on the ground and engage in various activities was not made by him. The sun, whose light and heat are indispensable for his life to flourish, was not created by him. The oxygen that he breathes and without which he would probably die in a couple of seconds wasn’t his invention. And so on and so forth...

In short, not a single thing that he possesses or avails of—in order to remain alive, to carry on his business and to derive pleasure from what he regards as his accomplishments—owes its origin to him. They are all a creation of the Creator of the universe! In other words, he is entirely dependent on all of these things on God even while fancying himself to be self-made and independent. While denying that he is dependent (on other human beings), he is blissfully ignorant of the fact that he (as is the case of everyone else) is actually totally and utterly dependent—on God.