How difficult it is to trust God! We are so quick to control every aspect of our lives. Yet, His peace far surpasses the feeling of a completed project. It is this true peace that we must seek at all costs.

We all know that trusting God does not mean doing nothing and waiting for Him to do everything. Even for salvation, which is a completely divine work, someone must bear witness, another person must explain how to change one’s life, and yet another must help a new convert understand their faith. God can do everything on His own, but He likes to work as a team with us (1 Corinthians 3:9), maybe so that we too can share in His joy when one of God’s plans comes to fruition. Therefore, trusting God does not mean letting Him do everything. But this is one of the greatest challenges of our Christian life: to what extent should we participate in God’s plans?

It’s much easier to fall asleep at night when we have every area of ​​our lives under our control. Our savings are in a safe place, we excel at our jobs, our house is clean, we’ve achieved our fitness goals for the day. Having everything under control seems to bring us peace. So we tend to work hard, doing everything we can to organize our days well, so as to keep every detail of our lives under this control. And that’s where we fall into the trap of taking control of the blessings God wants to give us. Single people, since we’re already managing other aspects of our lives well, we take the marriage plan into our own hands and start taking logical steps to accomplish it. Oh yes, we pray about it, but our prayer sometimes becomes “God, bless my plans”, instead of “God, what do you want me to do?”

Search your heart. Do you truly trust God, or are you trying to control different aspects of your life? “And my righteous ones will live by faith. But I will take no pleasure in anyone who turns away” (Hebrews 10:38 NLT). Think about it: the stakes are high. If we take control of our lives, we are no longer living by faith. And if we do that, God will not be pleased with us. How sad! You may bring to life a beautiful blessing, but it will not have pleased God. We have great examples of this in the Bible. Sarah, of course, who took matters into her own hands and gave her servant to Abraham to bring the fulfillment of the promise (Genesis 16). Or the story of King Hezekiah. Stricken with a terminal illness, he begged God to heal him. God answered his prayer and added fifteen years to his life. Later, he had a son, Manasseh, who is considered one of the worst kings in history. He should have simply trusted God, but he forced God’s hand, and the result was horrific.

It is very difficult to constantly rely on the Lord. Perhaps that is why the Bible says to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17 NKJV). Bring your plans or desires to God and ask Him what you should do. Do what He has advised, but don’t take control of the whole matter; stop at what He has asked you to do. Then, place it back in His hands. Several times a day, if necessary, because the temptation to regain control will return. “Lord, I truly desire this blessing. If you want me to do something else to receive it, tell me. Otherwise, I trust you. I place this in your hands. I don’t want to force this blessing because I want to please you above all else. But I also don’t want to lose a blessing through negligence, so Lord, I surrender to you, and I will follow you. And if this blessing isn’t good for me, I don’t want to be like King Hezekiah, so don’t give it to me. I trust you.”

The secret to success in this challenge of surrender is to pray this kind of prayer every time the project comes to mind. Multiple times of day if you need to. Your peace must come from your relationship with God, not from trying to control the fulfillment of promises. Be firm in this position; don’t get caught up in the frenzy of control. “You will keep in perfect peace all who trust in you, all whose thoughts are fixed on you!” (Isaiah 26:3 NLT). That is a different kind of peace than the peace we feel when we complete a task or achieve a goal. But it is a peace that pleases God, and that is the peace that surpasses understanding (Philippians 4:7).