Oct 23 2008
Giving it All to God
Here’s an expression that we hear so often that it makes one wonder if there’s anything to it. Has this become a mere platitude that rolls too easily off the tongue, or is there a sincere wanting, a profound ability, to actually give it up? If we say that we are going to place a concern in the Lord’s hands, and then continue to worry about the outcome, have we denied the power of Christ? And how do we overcome our human nature and allow ourselves to not worry? If you think that this is going to be an instructional guide on how to accomplish such a task in 3 easy lessons, think again!
If a particular situation is out of your control to begin with, how can you give that situation to God? How do you give away something that you do not have? Perhaps, even though the situation itself is out of our control, our tendency to worry about it can be given up. The problem I have in my personal life is that there seems to be a world of difference, an unbridgeable chasm, between my desire to release the worry and my ability to actually do it. I find that the depiction Paul gives of his personal condition in Romans 7:19, applies all too much to myself. “For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.”
When we are faced with a problem concerning an unyielding adult child, an inevitable certainty or a personal limitation, we oftentimes resign ourselves and say, “I have to give it to God.” Then we spend the time between that decision and the eventual outcome, worrying about the very thing we were supposed to have given away. Even the phrasing of the statement, “I have to give it to God,” shows our obstinacy and reluctance to release control. To, “have,” to do something smacks of not wanting to do it. We are saying that we are compelled to do it because we have run out of options, we have no recourse to accomplish a given task on our own. But we wish it weren’t so.
The providence of God is such, that nothing that occurs is outside of the scope of His permission. That which God does not directly cause, He ordains that it should be allowed to occur. Even in the severe testing of Job, Satan first had to receive God’s permission to afflict him, and in that permission restraints were set. So with the knowledge that God is our Father, and that He wants what is best for us, (even if we sometimes can not see how the situation will benefit us), and knowing too, that He will work all things to the good for those who love Him and are called to His purpose, why should this be so hard? Jesus tells us that we are not to worry using the birds as an example. Matthew 6: 26 “Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?”
Maybe it’s just me, but I find it extremely distressing that there are others who know me better than I seem to know myself. We are blinded to many of our own faults but our friends see them. God knows us better than anyone, but He’s God! He get’s a free pass on that sort of thing. But Satan? How is it that he gets to know me so much better than I know myself? He knows exactly which strings to pull and which buttons to push to drive me nuts. In our most devoted moments of prayer we can know that God will do the thing that is best for us and yet, no sooner than we speak the, “Amen,” we find a voice saying, “But what if He doesn’t?” How little is the faith that thinks that it wears the whole armor of God, and yet finds Satan’s arrows, seeming to piercing right through?
I know it can not be true, but sometimes it sure seems like Lucifer had a hand in our creation. God gives us a heart with an immense capacity for love, a brain capable of understanding deep wisdom and unfathomable knowledge and then Satan says, “But lets make the neck so narrow that the information in the head has a hard time becoming experience in the heart and any experience that should develop in the heart will find an impossible path to the head.” It is far easier for me to acquire a head full of Godly information than it is for me to incorporate that knowledge into emotional conviction in my heart. Similarly, I feel and experience all manner of emotion while finding that I don’t understand the reasons behind them. I can be angry, tearfully weepy or even giddy without a clue why I should be feeling that way, but just as easily, I can be in a situation that could be expected to generate a particular emotion and find myself at the other end of the spectrum.
It occurs to me that if I truly am the odd duck in realizing these things, I may have just lost all credibility as a writer, but I can’t worry about that; I have to, “give it to God.” I find comfort in God’s Word. Ecclesiastes teaches us that there is nothing new under the sun, that all experiences in this human existence are common to man. If even an Apostle could see his own failings, (as did Paul), though set apart by God, I have hope that the challenge of surrender to the power of Jesus Christ is attainable. Though I may go kicking and complaining though the halls of grace, I know that I am being grown by the trial.
We are to thank God that we have been found worthy to be subjected to the trials in our daily lives. Our growth comes through the afflictions we face and in realizing the victories that Christ wins in us. To release our supposed right to worry over things that, for the most part, are out of our control is difficult because it seems un-natural. The world has conditioned us to think that when we reach the end of our rope we should tie a knot and hold on; God wants us to simply let go and trust that He will be there to catch us. Even though this seems to run contrary to common sense, it is only our imperfect, human concept of common sense that is getting in our way.
When I was in school, I took part in a class that exposed me to trust exercises. The thing that I remember the most, out of all that we did in that class, was the falling exercise. We were to stand with our backs to our partner and, with our arms slightly outstretched to the sides, fall backward off our heels. The sensation of falling with your legs locked was extremely un-nerving. Can I trust that that my partner will catch me? How badly will I be hurt if they don’t? These questions raced through my mind in the few short seconds that made up the seeming eternity before I felt the grasp of my catcher. As anxious as I felt at the anticipation of spilling my brains on the floor while I was falling, the relief of feeling the catch was immeasurable greater.
We can not know the relief of falling into the hands of God unless we are willing to surrender to the fall. Does this mean that we won’t be apprehensive the next time we are called to be tested? Maybe not. But the repetition, the practice of falling and being caught time after time, will gradually build in us a level of trust that increases with each trial. My logic says this is so but in practice, (and honesty), it is still something that I struggle with. This is what I think discipleship is all about, putting it out there so we can see ourselves in those around us; admitting our various failings, so that we can encourage one another to a stronger walk in Christ.
If you are anything like me, you know a lot more of God’s truth than you are able to live. I think that this is the situation we all find ourselves muddling through. This is also why it is so important that we get into God’s Word and make God’s Word a part of us. Only by immersing ourselves in the truth, which is the Lord Jesus Christ, can we grow stronger and become more obedient. We should all have, as a goal, the desire to be able to hear the whole world say that we can’t; hear Christ say, “Yes, you can,” and believe the Lord over all. If I am allowed to fall so that the glory of God might be displayed in His catching me, then I pray that I can fall…
All for the Glory of Christ