“Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” Ephesians 3:20-21

Control or Out of Control

What are you trying to control–your husband, children, household, a family member? Or are you trying to control a financial situation, a job situation, an illness? How about your emotions, or your temper? We spend so much of our time and effort trying to control our lives and yet we really control very little.

The recent flooding, choices of our government officials, our next door neighbor, our liberal friend, our conservative friend, stock prices, ISIS, myriad other people and things that can drive us to a frenzy—WE CAN’T CONTROL any of it.

So what do we do? As good, Bible-believing, saved women, we fall to our knees and pray. We start to tell God about our husband, our child, our government, our friend, the weather and pretty soon we are trying to control the God of the universe with our ideas of how to fix this or that or do this or that.

Is this kind of prayer wrong? If it stops there, perhaps. We should pour out our hearts to God the Father. He is our anchor and safe tower for all that concerns us (Hebrews 6:19, Proverbs 18:10, Psalm 138:8) and we are told to cast our cares on Him because He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7). We open a conversation with Him, draw near to Him (James 4:8), but if we stop our prayer there with our ideas and our control, we are right back where we started.

So what do we do from there? Having purged ourselves of every care, we then abandon ourselves to Him and His will. We hand the control to Jesus and LET GO! We let Jesus take care of us and all those other things because He is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. He has a good plan (Jeremiah 29:11). He is able to save completely (Hebrews 7:25). We believe Him because He is faithful (Deuteronomy 7:9).

“Father in heaven, please forgive us when our prayers stop at telling You how to fix it. Help us to abandon ourselves to Your will and good plan for us. Help us to let go and trust that You’ve got it and then, like the lambs of a flock, go out and enjoy the good things that You have placed in this day and not miss You. Amen.”