The Compassion International Bloggers network gave a writing prompt in late December and I am just getting around to writing about it now. I will use the busy mother of 3 excuse for that one :). They said to write about one word that you want to focus on in the coming year. I did some praying about it and I felt that God was asking me to give up the illusion of control in my life. I say illusion because that is what control is. In reality, I don’t have control over anything, but I like to pretend that I do. I finally landed on the word surrender for 2016.
The word surrender terrifies me for a number of reasons, but I truly believe that this was what I am to work on in 2016. One of the reasons it is terrifying is because I want to be comfortable, and surrendering my life to Christ doesn’t sound comfortable. Peter and I were joking about some words that we think describe us and he said adventure for himself, and I replied with the word snuggly for myself. We both laughed because we know that comfort is very important to me. I think the reason that I want to control everything is because I think it will help me feel more comfortable. When in all actuality I think trying to control everything makes me less comfortable and more stressed out/worried about stuff. So, in a way, surrendering may make me feel more comfortable after all!
When I knew that surrender would be my word, I started wishing that I would have an easier word like peace. What I have come to understand is that I will be gaining peace by surrendering. My life is not peaceful when I am running all over like a crazy person trying to figure everything out for myself. I worry constantly that something terrible will happen to my kids, Peter, myself, or extended family. I also worry about my children’s feelings, plans for our family, and the future in general. I am not in control of any of these things. I could try to control everything but I will fail EVERY SINGLE TIME. I don’t get to control the way my children are treated by their peers or how they feel about themselves. I don’t get to have all of my plans fall into alignment like I want them to. I don’t actually control anything. The more I realize how powerless I am and how powerful the God that I serve is the more peaceful my life will become.
Surrendering everything to Christ is going to take a lot of prayer. My first instinct is to try to take over in situations where I feel powerless, and I know that it will be necessary to be on my knees way more frequently than what my life has previously modeled. Prayer is the way that I can understand what it is that God is asking of me. I am ashamed to say that I haven’t always spent a lot of time thinking about God’s plans for my life and I have spent countless hours trying to make Krystal’s plans work. I can definitely relate to Solomon when he said, “Meaningless, meaningless.” All of Krystal’s plans are meaningless without seeking what God wants.
So with that I feel it is going to be a loaded 2016. I understand that as a Christian I should have this surrender thing down pat since it is pretty much the foundation of our faith, but I struggle. I am looking forward to leaning on God, and being in good communication with God through His Word and through prayer. I know that many trials can and will come my way, but my prayer is that I will still be standing because I am building my faith on a firm foundation.