the answer is simple

A friend wrote this in a casual conversation over a year ago, and it's stuck with me ever since.

We want God's ends by our own means. We want to love, but want the love to come from us. In the process, what we've really done is tainted the idea of love itself because God is love and to separate Him from it in our minds is to downplay both the character of the Lord and the power and significance of love. As always, the answer is simple: we need to know Christ better.

The Lord's ways are not like mine, His are so much higher, stronger, and purer. I'll have a great goal (like wanting to serve Him), yet if I try to do His will in my own power I still miss out on the whole point of living life on this earth. Every day that passes I become more convinced that the great mysteries of life are really quite simple. Like Naaman's servant, I often ask myself, "If the prophet had bid you to do some great thing, would not you have done it? How much rather then, when he says, "Wash and be clean?" (2 Kings 5:13) The Lord's invitation is still there and I keep coming back to one of my father's favorite passages of Scripture. In these verses lie the keys to understanding salvation and sanctification.

Matthew 11:28-30
Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.