SOSR Blog

Learning to trust the process is often easier said than done. Life is filled with a series of trust opportunities. Learning to let go of self-reliance is one of the most difficult things in life to do.

Thinking back over the last month, I’m sure you can recount at least one time where you needed to surrender your need for control.

Maybe it was…

Your youngest or only child just went off to kindergarten, or it was your oldest heading off to college.

Either way, you were left with an empty nest and a void of time you didn’t know how to fill.

Someone in your immediate family needed to undergo a complex surgery.

Your fear and anxiety of all the “what if’s” consumed every ounce of your being. Sleep was not to be had.

You were asked to do a job that was beyond your expertise but you were expected to pull it off, well, because   isn’t that what you always do?

Letting go of the perfectionist “I can do it myself” attitude allows for help to enter in.

Over the last several months, I have found myself in some hard places. Places that required complete surrender on my part.

On the eve of my first training, I found myself without a voice. Imagine the fear and doubt that swept over my mind:

• How can you deliver a training if they can’t hear you?
• This company took a risk in hiring you and right out of the gate you are going to fail them.
• You aren’t qualified to do this and losing your voice proves it.
• What if they don’t have a microphone or worse yet what if they have one and it doesn’t work?
• How are you ever going to do six days of training without a voice, you should just quit now and save yourself the embarrassment.

It was in this moment I had a choice. Two paths were staring me in the face…

Do I continue to fight this in my own strength where worry, fear and doubt were my answers? Or, do I admit that I have come to end of myself and it was only through the strength of God that this training was ever going to happen?

My self-reliant attitude was dying along with my voice. Both were being stripped away.

And, so here it was, I surrendered.

As I agreed to walk down His path of peace, the stress that seemed so high was lowered with each passing moment.

He arrived right on time. His voice projected through me…minute by minute, hour by hour and day by day. Microphone or no microphone His message was delivered with the Power only He can muster.

Our God is faithful.

And just in case I wasn’t clear on who was actually in charge, my voice was stripped away as each of the six days came to a close.

Yes, He knows me well. Self-reliance is an old habit that dies hard.

I’m sure we all find ourselves in over our head. You know that place where your ability to fix things is stripped away.

Given a few moments of self-reflection, I’m sure you can recount similar situations where you have had a choice to make…will it be your way or God’s way?

All of these circumstances allow for the opportunity for the His provision to enter in. Trusting that He is far more capable of bringing the best results requires a surrender that can only be tested in the hard places.

What has God taken away to help you surrender—to lovingly nudge you toward choosing Him over self-reliance?

Click here if you want to dig deeper in reflection.