How often do we feel that situations are out of our control? Circumstances collide and leave us afraid that life is getting out of control! We often struggle with the feeling of lack and fight the feelings of helplessness and panic. The idea that we are “in control” is more an illusion than a fact! The truth is that at some point and at many times, we are not in control. If we ever were! One of our family members was driving toward the 1289 junction when they hit a patch of slick road and spun their truck around twice in the middle of the road and ended up backed in the ditch headed the opposite direction! Everything appeared to be fine, but the danger of hydroplaning was real! We can never control other people, their actions, or their reactions. Yet much of our frustration results from the vain attempt to do just that!
Uncomfortable as it is, we all struggle even to exercise some regiment of constant control over ourselves. We all know that we are often unable to control even the tongue, the smaller member of the body. With the tongue out of control, our behavior and entire life get out of balance quickly!
When things begin spinning out of control, what do we do? We often tighten our grip, which often takes us into a skid, which is “totally out of control”! We simply try harder to put it all back together again the way it was and often the personal cost is greater than we can afford.
A friend told me about one of his grandsons who was playing in the front yard with a large cardboard box. He was attempting to build a fort, as little boys with vivid imaginations seem to want to do. He gathered some other “building materials” that he would need. additional pieces of cardboard and a large towel for its roof. He began assembling each piece carefully as his mind envisioned it. There was one problem. It was a windy day, and his fort could not withstand the occasional and sudden gust of wind. Patiently, he would regather his supplies and reconstruct his building only to see it blown apart by another gust. This grandfather waited, hoping the lad would solicit advice or assistance. Would he become frustrated? Try harder to secure his fort against the winds? Become angry? Think of himself as a failure?
Without a word of complaint, the boy disappeared into the house, emerging a few minutes later with a frisbee in hand. “Grandpa, would you like to play frisbee with me?” What an excellent example! He stopped trying to control what he could not control, and the boy chose a way to work with his circumstances!
Happiness and success are not really about control, but it is always a choice! Remember the Biblical character of Hagar? Hagar was the servant girl of Sarah, Abraham’s wife. Hagar was a slave, owned by another and having no options except to do as she was told. Hagar enjoyed no control in the matters that directly affected her daily life. She knew few, if any, choices as a slave to Sarah.
At Sarah’s direction, Hagar bore a child, Ishmael, to Abraham. Sarah raised him in a vain attempt to accomplish the promise God had made many years earlier. After thirteen years, Isaac, the son God had promised, was born, and Ishmael and Hagar were no longer needed or wanted by Sarah. Possibly in jealousy or as a painful reminder of a foolish moment, at Sarah’s insistence, Hagar and Ishmael were sent away. Hagar had no control previously, nor did she now! Soon their provisions were exhausted, and the helpless mother laid her young teen son in the shade of a bush and went far enough away that she could not feel the greater pain of her son’s cries of hunger and thirst. Hagar did not control the circumstances that put them there, nor could she change them. But God!
God, Who is always in control, heard the lad’s cries that Hagar could not bear to hear, and sent an angel to bring a promise from God of a future and a hope, and showed them God’s provisions for their immediate needs! Now, Hagar faced a choice that she could make, in the middle of a desperate situation that she could not control. Would she trust God even when she did not understand? Would she accept God’s answer, when she did not have any answers of her own?
How often do we feel like Hagar! Circumstances have occurred that we would not have chosen. Others have made decisions without our counsel or consent that complicate our lives and confuse our limited options. Jesus told the story about two men who built their homes. Neither of them could control the elements that could threaten them, but they chose the foundations upon which they built. One chose a solid rock; the other chose unstable sand. When the storm came (not, if one came – they will surely come!) that they did not choose and could not control, one had chosen wisely and the other foolishly. Jesus said that the man who built on a rock for a solid foundation is like a man who hears the Words of the Lord and obeys them!
When we “lose control,” and we surely will, we need to make sure we choose to trust in Jesus and depend upon His Word. He is the only one who truly knows the future and can fully be trusted!
