We Only Have Control Of Ourselves

When things in our lives are not going the way we had planned it is easy to cry out to God in wonder of where God is.  This is not a new feeling.  Ancient theology from Old Testament times attributed everything that happened to gods.  For Israel, everything was attributed to God, the only true God.  When they weren’t winning battles that signaled to them that God was not present with them.  Such was the case of the corporate prayer found in Psalm 60.  Israel was not winning battles and they cried out to God laying claim that God had rejected them. 

The truth is God does not reject us.  We reject God.  We make choices that move us away from God.  We make choices that contribute to our own shortcomings and failures.  It is a corporate we.  I certainly don’t have a theology that suggests that everything bad that happens to us happens because we have done something wrong.  That is ludicrous.  Humanity as a whole does much that contributes to the bad things that happen in this world.  We don’t take care of the creation God has given us.  That improper care leads to disease and disaster many times.  We don’t treat each other with love and dignity and respect. 

While I certainly don’t believe that all bad things occur because of something we have done wrong, I also believe that when things are falling apart the only thing we have control over is our own actions.  We would be remiss not to examine ourselves and see where we might need to make adjustments in our own behaviors. 

I had such a moment on June 12.  I reached out to my health and fitness coach as I sat here at this desk in prayer and recognized that while I was in school I had neglected a lot of things and people in my life.  I had also neglected my own health and well-being.  My coach recommended two books to me that day.  One was Joyce Myer’s Making Good Habits, Breaking BadHabits.  The other was Brene’ Brown’sGifts of Imperfection.  Armed with those two books and a book I had read several years ago, Sink Reflections,  by Maria Cilley I set out to transform my personal life.  It was not God who had rejected me.  I had rejected myself.  God was never absent from my life.  God is always present if only I take time to be still in God’s presence and listen for the whispers to my heart.  The same is true for you.  When life seems upside down and out of control take control of the only thing you have control over.  Take control of you and your behavior and do it with God in the yoke with you, present with you, and guiding you every step of the way.  Then you can say as the psalmist of Psalm 60 concluded “With God we will triumph; he’s the one who will trample our adversaries.”  (vs. 12, CEB)