Fear of Letting Go

I began my open journey of dicarding (after digging up and divulging) my fears in my last post. I continue that journey here with the admission that while my heart's desire is to radically abandon myself completely to God and His perfect plan for my life, the flesh in me clings tight. Like someone clinging to the side of a cliff not knowing the ledge is less than ten feet away, I cling to the idea that I have to work at things.

God recently dig a great work in me and gave me the freedom of knowing I don't have to work at everything - approval, acceptance, accolades.

Yet I still hold back. I don't want to completely let go. I know this because I do things like make my to do list without first praying about it. I pray for others, ask God to take control of my heart, but I don't go to Him with the details of my life. Why is that?

If I'm going to be completely open and honest, it's because I'm afraid of what I'll have to let go if I submit every detail of my life. What I eat. What I wear. What I write. What I watch on TV. What I listen to on the radio. How I spend every moment of every day. How I acknowledge Him with every breath I take.

Truly, I think this is a common fear - of both believers and unbelievers. We are afraid of what God will ask us to give up if we submit to Him. The things we like and enjoy. What we forget is that every second, every breath is a gift from Him and He willingly fills us up with more than we could ever imagine. If I give up certain things that bring me enjoyment, will He give what will bring me more joy? Of course He will, it just doesn't always look like what we would like it to look like.

So, I talk to myself, pause to pray one more time, and ask God to empty me of me and slowly pry each finger off the ledge, knowing He's waiting to catch me in His everlasting arms of love.

Fear of Abandonment

It's quite funny what God will do when you open yourself up. I've never been a fearful person. It's not part of my nature and I wasn't taught to be fearful. I'm more one of those people who jump head first into things, figuring that everything will work out.

Lately, however, God has been showing me my deep, hidden fears. They are less tangible than fears of some tragedy, injury, or disaster.

The first fear revealed was the fear that my ministry (i.e. speaking, writing, and getting published) would grow faster than my family was ready for. I am confident that my initial book hasn't sold yet because, at least in part, my family has not been ready for it. With my youngest child barely two, how in the world would I have been traveling and doing events on a regular basis before now? Life is busy and crazy as it is. While I know that God is in control of every detail - down to when and if I get published and where, when, and if I have a speaking ministry - I have to get it to my heart. If I have even the slightest concern about what affect my ministry growing will have on my family, then I'm not trusting that God is in control and has my and my family's best interest at heart. He has plans for each of us and all those plans somehow work out perfectly for all of us.

That doesn't mean that I don't step into things carefully and prayerfully. On the contrary, I could very easily try to finagle and work my way to a "successful" ministry. Then I would be out of bounds of God's will and protection and be neglecting my call, which is to first minister to my family. But neither do I want to hold back when God is coaxing me forward. I want to be abandoned completely to His will. I simply have to tell my heart to give up all of its own wants and desires, other than the single desire to be radically abandoned to the one and only Lord of my life.