Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Locked in Place

Read at your own risk.  Watch your toes.  They may begin to smart.

Please move to the right if you like things to go according to plan, if you like things to be "in order", if you really don't like deviations from what you expect.  You are not really a "surprise" person, are you?

Welcome to who I used to be.  Many of you may still be there.  Most of you like it there just fine and have no intentions of changing or moving to the other side.  You are comfortable in this well-defined place; you know it, and it "fits".  You may rationalize that "someone has to be in charge, someone has to be responsible” and it may as well be you.  Or maybe, the fear of the unknown has kept you locked there in the Land of Control, but you've always wondered what it would be to step out of this place and be spontaneous, happy even. 

Maybe you are the person who trusts God for His best and desires to be in His will but are living in fear that you will miss it because you might make the “wrong choice”—not a sinful choice, just not what God had planned.  This job or that one, Lord?  This house or the other one?  This man forever or wait for another?  What do You have for me, Lord?  I don't want to move until I know, until You show me, until I can see the next step, the next mile, the next year.

That was my way.  Thankfully, Father God says that my ways are not HIS ways.  In fact, He tells us that we cannot even begin to imagine what He thinks or plans.

"My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts," says the LORD. "And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine."
Isaiah 55:8
(New Living Translation)

At some point, I discovered that the way I was living life wasn’t working for me.  I didn’t like the unhappiness and discontent I felt when things didn’t go according to my plans.  With three small step-children and a brand new husband, nothing went the way I expected or wanted.  I needed control.  I needed to be in control!  Years passed, and I grew increasingly more and more miserable.  I did not enjoy life because my life was not what I planned for it to be.  I cannot clearly define the moment I decided I didn’t want to be in control anymore; it was more of a “growing” to that point.   Day by day, I cultivated my relationship with my Father, reading His Word, praying His Words back to Him, asking Him to speak LIFE into my life.  And He did, gently turning my anger and discontent to joy and peace, boldly bringing sisters into my life who knew this freedom and claimed it for me, generously pouring love into me, freeing me from myself and my misconceptions of what life should be, who I should be.  Sweet, sweet freedom!

Do I still long to know His plan?  Yes, but I do not ask Him to show me before I move.  I ask for Him to steer me as I move, as I step out in faith.  I do not have to be in control; I have to be in step, in touch with the heart and will of God.  The closer I become to Him, the more I have the heart and mind of Christ and the more assured I am of walking where He leads.

I do believe that God has a plan for my life, and it is the best.  Jeremiah 29:11 says For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”  Does that mean that I believe that He has only “good things for me”, that He will not allow me to go through trials and difficulties?  Alas, no.  It means I believe that God has a plan for me—a plan for me to grow closer to Him, a plan for me to grow deeper in love with Him, a plan for me to become more like Him, a plan to build my character to be like the character of Jesus.  And in doing those things, I know that I am in His perfect plan.  That I can count on.

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