I went into launch weekend broken and dependent on God. I had been struggling all week with my emotions. I didn’t want to leave and yet, I couldn’t wait to be in another country. I was afraid of leaving because I have lost touch with all my childhood friends who went on missions trips longer than 2 weeks.
As the week leading into it had progressed, God had been peeling back layers of pain, bitterness, fear, and pride that I was used to hiding behind. He showed me that I had created this image in my head of who I thought others wanted me to be and was living according to that standard instead of His. Honestly, it was probably one of the hardest weeks of my life as I realized how deeply parts of a false self were imbedded into the way I think and live. False because my identity is now found in Christ not the patterns of this world.
I don’t know what I have gotten myself into but I know I can’t control it. And that terrifies me. I don’t want to give up the control I think I have. And yet I know that I don’t really have that control to begin with. So why is it so hard to admit that I can’t control my life? Why do I struggle to be okay with surrender?
Pride. Independence. Idolatry of self.
God, what have I become? But it isn’t what I’ve become – it’s who I’ve allowed myself to remain. This life these habits – they are my old self that I have put off in taking up the new in Christ. And yet I cling with stubborn will to the comfort of the familiar. In doing so, I condemn myself to stagnancy – lack of development, advancement or progressive movement; showing little or no activity or vitality; inactive or sluggish.
This can’t be right! This is not what it means to live abundantly.
When we cling to the comfort of the familiar, we refuse to press on towards abundant life. If I’m trying to maintain control, I can only do so from the known. So in trying to be in control, I’m deciding not to grow.
I want to grow and fully live out my true identity. I want to be free from this false self with its habits that condemns me to a life lacking abundance. I must surrender to be free and I have a feeling that will be a theme that comes up quite frequently this next year.
