"I Could Not Possibly Do Otherwise"
I recently came back across the passage below from Brother Lawrence's The Practice of the Presence of God:
When an occasion arose which required some virtue, he said to God, "Lord, I cannot do this unless You allow me." After that, he received strength more than sufficient. When he had failed in his duty, he simply confessed his fault, saying to God, "I could not possibly do otherwise, if You leave me to myself. It is You who must correct my failing, and mend what is amiss." And after this, he gave himself no further uneasiness about his mistake.
The line that interrupted me was, "I could not possibly do otherwise, if You leave me to myself."
It's a candid confession about our moral incapacity without God. Without God, failure is assured. We are unsteady and inconstant creatures. Expert in self-sabotage. Our wounds self-inflicted. When left to ourselves, we cannot do anything but fail and damage ourselves and others.
"I could not possibly do otherwise, if You leave me to myself."
Reminds me of a line from the song Southern Cross by Crosby, Stills, & Nash:
"So we cheated and we lied and we tested
And we never failed to fail, it was the easiest thing to do..."
Brother Lawrence's prayer is simple, yet holds a lot of truth.