A thought by Lisa Whittle from her book, Jesus Over Everything (p. 9). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon to buy the book.)
But we do need something, don't we?
Lisa says, "Sometimes you need God to finally run yours. Too often we throw perfectly good lives in the trash in search of ones we end up tarnishing all over. The core of why our lives don’t work isn’t the life itself but what we internally never made right. This is why we wind up repeating patterns."
She goes on, "I’ve watched humans awhile, and I have a theory. Despite our temporary feelings, there are three things that make our lives not work in the long term: 1.too many options 2.getting away with something that is not good for us 3.trying to handle everything ourselves.
"Too many options lead to mental confusion, second-guessing, and dissatisfaction with our lives. We spend our lives in angst over the great what ifs—what if we had picked that life or that spouse or that job or made that choice instead of this one, and the list goes on. We don’t have to sit in scarcity, for the most part, and we are glad about that, but the allure of option is what actually drives us mad. More options are not what we are after. A less-complicated life is. Options will not help with that, but we like them, regardless."
She continues, "Getting away with things we know aren’t good for us isn’t working for us either. For months, maybe years, I knew shopping wasn’t holding me together. I knew it wasn’t helping me live a more purposeful, focused life. It was muddying the waters. Many times I could have run to Jesus to help me sort out something, but I ran to Nordstrom Rack instead. Most of the time when I wanted something on sale, I really wanted His peace. I thwarted lasting spiritual thirst-quenching by taking water breaks. Every sinner grows weary enough eventually, and we want permanent deliverance—not just sips that get us by. It’s a matter of how dehydrated we allow ourselves to become while on the journey. Admitting that something that isn’t hurting us visibly is a sin is perhaps the hardest leap to make. Deflection is far easier, and a lot of us are experts.
"And then there’s the issue of our crippling belief in self-sufficiency. The most capable, independent human is one in whom perhaps God alone knows the weak spot. Eventually the bootstraps wear from over-pulling. The brute strength comes to an end. The flesh struggle never does. It’s why promises of self-sufficiency are damaging to a world hungry to bypass God. We are eager for that message, though fools to believe it. If we could fast-track our process to getting what we want and go around God, we would, every time—He’s too slow and generally uncooperative for our liking in most cases. We like our independence, and we may even do well with it for a time. But eventually we will let ourselves down and lose confidence in our abilities—a place where God can do some of His greatest work. And in that place we will desperately want someone to take care of us."
She then says, "We like options until they make life too complicated. We like doing what we want until our choices make matters worse. We like our independence until we need to be taken care of.
"Too often, when our lives no longer work, we assume it is time to get new lives: pull out of marriages, leave churches, search for quick fixes to solve money issues, cut friendships, move somewhere else, drop a project to start a new one. And at the end of the day, we are still left with the hole within. What we actually need is for God to adjust the lives we have by taking over and running things. When we build a life on the priority of experiences, we can expect to get disillusioned by the highs and lows. Nothing is worse than living unsettled. Nothing is more symptomatic of human self-governance than living from high to high."
And that is so true, isn't it?
Yes, yes!
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