Confessions of a Control Freak

Confessions of a Control Freak

Learning to Let Go

My intuition isn’t faith

My gut reaction isn’t faith

My experience isn’t faith

My own understanding, not faith

My provision isn’t God’s provision

Whoa!

Whoa, God…hold up a minute, what you’re saying is you want me to let go? You want my trust, my surrender? You want me to quit looking at what I think I know and just trust you with reckless abandon?

Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Ephesians 3:20

Yes, I have to believe that’s what God is saying, that yes, he does want my complete trust. “According to your faith be it unto you”, he said to those two blind men in Matthew 9. It doesn’t make sense in my logical mind that my heavenly father could speak just a few words and sight would be restored, but it happened. They believed that he was able and because of their faith they were healed. Again, WHOA.

A simple truth I’m currently learning:

Things aren’t always what they seem.

My current life experience causes me to know that 1+1=2. I trust that, I’ve seen it done and used that method thousands of times. In the kingdom of God things don’t always add up just so. A step back can mean a step forward and math isn’t quite how we often figure it. God does miracles, His ways are higher than ours. You know what this simple truth helps me with? Judgement, Grace and Faith. It teaches me to trust in God’s provision and not man’s. If God can perform miracles in each of us that could be at any moment taking place under the surface, I must suspend judgement of another in what could be a horrendous situation. I could look at a drug addict and shake my head, hopeless. I could look at a family that I think has no way to make ends meet and think, hopeless. I could look at orphans and widows in poverty and sigh, hopeless. Or I could look at Jesus and trust His higher ways, He causes the blind to see, He restores sight. What could God be doing under the surface in life of the addict, the homeless, the orphan….my friends, my family?

Things aren’t always what they seem.

If I understand that God is living and active, I look for miracles instead of sigh with hopelessness.

God is teaching this control freak to live in the moment. He’s pushing me out of the details that I so easily get bogged down in and into the waves of complete and total trust in a savior who is far more able than me. I have to be honest, for so long I’ve trusted myself for provision but if God wants me to do great things for his glory I’ve got to learn as I am now to trust for more than I’m capable of.

Faith isn’t a math equation, it’s not God if I do this you are obligated to do this. You can play by all the rules and things will still end up differently than you expected. All people have a journey to walk, sometimes you have to go through the muck to get to the mountain top. Sometimes you have to rest, sometimes you have to suck it up and dig your heels in and grind up the mountain. It’s about the journey and your character more than the destination and having comfortable circumstances. What you learn in the dark places can bring you closer to God. When He is your only hope, He’s close.

I think it’s going to be uncomfortable to adopt this truth. I’m not going to know what tomorrow holds and that makes me want to run and hide. But I have a God that tells me to pray for my “DAILY” bread, not my weekly, monthly, or yearly bread, but daily. I think He meant that, trust me today and keep trusting me, day, by day, by day, by day. Stay out of the details little one and trust me for miraculous provision. Trust the healer, the provider, the God of more than enough. What if on MY provision (Jennifer’s provision) I had enough? Ok fine, I have enough for me and mine. But what if on God’s provision (you know the one I have to let go of control for) I have more than enough? That’s something to think about. Enough, I store and hoard and worry and fret and I have to do and work and strive and make it happen. More then Enough, I share, I give, I trust, I love, and I rest that God will provide the next, MORE THAN ENOUGH. And God gets all the glory!

Challenge Accepted!

Jennifer Burgess