Surrendering control

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“Come to me, all who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” – Matthew 11:28

When God wants us to surrender control

I often feel it’s my duty to be responsible for absolutely everything in my home. I feel like the main character from the movie “Bad Moms“…running around on a daily basis attempting to organise my kid’s lives, taking the kids to after school clubs and extra curricular activities, making sure homework is done, ensuring sure there is some sort of order at home to prevent absolute chaos, and keeping up with work and my career. Unfortunately, I don’t do very well at attempting to manage everyone’s life let alone my own. Most of the time to be truly honest I’m hanging on by a thread.

Raising little people feels like a permanent full time job. My goals at attempting to be organised, efficient and tidy over time started to get a little out of control. I thought creating order would help ease my anxiety and reduce my stress levels. That if I walked into a neat tidy house after work everyday somehow it would help to declutter my mind. God revealed to me that this was one of the coping mechanisms I was using to help me deal with the anxiety that I suffered on a constant basis.

“For I know the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future...Jeremiah 29:11

God’s will for us is to live everyday in abundance. That means pure joy, peace, anxiety free and present, living in the now.

I am the vine, you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:5

Attempting to do things all on my own resulted in anxiety, stress and mental exhaustion. For years I struggled to understand the concept of allowing God to take control or to even surrender control over to him. I knew I wanted to do so I simply just didn’t know how. I was drained almost all the time. The stress of dealing with work, and the pressure to keep up with so much in this modern world and still trying to take care of myself was seemingly impossible. How could I take care of myself when so many things demanded my attention? Trying to explain exactly what I was so stressed about to my husband made things even worse because of the guilt and fear of sounding as if I was complaining. The truth is, some of us are better able to deal and cope with the everyday stresses that come with life and for some of us it’s a bit more of a struggle. The Bible says that He shows his strength in our weaknesses and we all have we weaknesses.

I’m growing in my walk with God and slowly beginning to understand what it means when God asks us to surrender control over to him. He is calling us to lay our burdens at his feet. For me, this means waking up each morning asking God to help me to let go of what I cannot manage on that day. I’ve learned the importance of having a quiet hour to myself everyday. Sometimes it means going for a run/walk or having a quiet coffee in the early morning. When I do this I can step back and I’m not longer overwhelmed by the minute details that attempt to strip the joy out of my life. I can step back and enjoy my family and appreciate the good that God has provided for me and enjoy the abundance that he continues to shower me with every day.