Not my will

"Faith does not dictate to God but surrenders to His love and care for us. You will not receive from God or have His blessings upon what you strain to get, attempt to hold on to, or insist on having, but only what you surrender to Him, including your health, your family, and your business."~ Don Whisnant, GracePoint Ministries, Atlanta, GA

God knew I needed this quote today. I read it while visiting my friend Vicki's blog Windows To My Soul. This is a blog worth signing up for and spending time pondering the wisdom shared there.

As I read the above words, the past few week’s wrestling match with God came to a decided end.

He won.

Thanks to this quote, I realized that while I had been seeking the Lord to understand what the inner restlessness stemmed from, I had also been refusing more than a few minutes of His presence.

I’d get teary listening to God remind me that I am His, but then I’d get up and go right back to trying to dictate to Him what I thought should happen next.

Right back to the “If you love me You’ll do this” mentality.

But I didn’t see I was doing that. Not until I read the quote above. “You will not receive from God or have His blessings upon what you strain to get, attempt to hold on to, or insist on having...”

Yep, that about sums up my life for the last few weeks especially.

But instead of being angry with me for not seeing it, God gently invited me to surrender.

So I sat at my desk with my hands lifted up and cried.

But God, how will I handle it if you don’t take away the physical issues that are weighing heavily on my heart?

How will I accept if you say “no” to this thing I really want to happen, this thing that I really believe is good.

What if nothing changes?

At this point, it was all I could do not to walk away. Then I remembered Jesus’ words when He wrestled with God’s will.

“Not my will, but Yours be done.”

I didn’t want to say them. Not one little bit.

But they rose up from my spirit against all the protests of my mind.

So I gave them voice. With fear and trembling, I laid my will down and said, “Not my will, but Yours be done.”

For each issue I’d been wrestling with God on, I handed it over and said again, “Not my will, but Yours be done.”

I still have no idea what God is going to do. But what I’ll hold onto instead of wrestling with Him is this:

God is good. He has good in store. I can entrust myself to His care and rest.

Rest.

After too much time wrestling, that sounds like a great idea.