The Beauty of a Surrendered Life

Yesterday, as I walked and talked with a friend over the phone, our conversation wandered into one of those places that stays with you long after the conversation has ended.

We talked about life. About our plans. Our efforts. The things we work so hard to make happen. The outcomes we try desperately to control. And somewhere along the way, we found ourselves reflecting on the futility of human effort compared to the divine.

 

Not that our efforts don't matter. They do.

We should plan. We should strategise. We should work hard and do our very best with what we have been given.

But perhaps our best efforts are just that — our best efforts.

They were never meant to guarantee the outcome.

And yet, how often do we cross that invisible line between doing our best and believing everything depends on us?

 

We strive. We worry. We overthink. Sometimes, if we are honest, we manipulate circumstances, conversations and even people, trying desperately to move life towards the outcome we think it should have.

But life is so much bigger than us.

There are too many moving pieces we cannot see. Too many lives intersecting with ours. Too many consequences we could never anticipate. Too many twists and turns that only begin to make sense when we look backwards.

 

Perhaps there is another way to live.

Perhaps we are meant to own our piece, do our best, let go and trust God with the outcome.

 

The Twists and Turns

I have been thinking about the twists and turns of my own life.

The things that went right. The things that went wrong. The people I met. The disappointments. The unexpected blessings. The things I prayed desperately for that didn't happen, and the things I never thought to pray for that somehow found their way to me.

 

Every encounter. Every fear. Every closed door and unexpected opening.

Somehow, it all becomes part of God's beautiful story of our lives.

I see more clearly now that His plan is bigger than my thoughts, my plans and my little circle.

 

I see my piece.

God sees the whole.

And perhaps surrender begins when I finally accept the difference.

 

Our Lives Create Ripples

Everything in life is connected in ways we may never fully understand.

The words we speak can live far beyond the moment in which we spoke them. An act of kindness can affect someone who then treats another person differently. A decision we make quietly today may eventually touch someone in a faraway place we will never meet.

 

Every action creates a ripple.

We simply don't know how far those ripples travel.

 

Knowing that should make us more thoughtful about how we live — how we speak, how we love, how we treat people and what we leave behind.

But perhaps it should also make us worry less about the things we cannot truly influence.

 

Our choices matter.

Our actions matter.

But we are not in control of where every ripple goes.

 

Our responsibility is not to control the entire ocean. It is to be faithful with the stone in our hand.

 

Own Your Piece

I keep coming back to this thought:

Own your piece.

 

We are all a piece of a bigger puzzle, an actor in a grand play whose entire script we have not been given.

We do not have to carry the whole story.

We simply have to play our part well.

 

Make the plan. Take the step. Do the work. Have the conversation. Use your gifts. Love the people God has placed around you. Help someone. Say sorry. Speak kindly. Plant the seed.

Do whatever is yours to do — and do it well.

Then let go.

 

There comes a point where effort must end and trust must begin.

There is enormous freedom in understanding that I can be responsible for my effort without making myself responsible for everything that happens next.

 

I can ask:

Did I do what I could?

Did I show up with love and integrity?

Did I faithfully use what God placed in my hands?

And if I have done my part, I can release the rest.

The outcome belongs to God.

 

Even the Storm Has a Purpose

Of course, surrender is easier when things are going well.

It is much harder when life doesn't look anything like we expected.

But perhaps even the storm has its place.

 

The storm shakes things. It exposes what is rooted and what is not. It separates what should remain from what needs to fall away.

But the storm does not have to blow us away from the Master.

Sometimes it does the opposite.

Sometimes it blows away the things we were holding too tightly and brings us back to the feet of our Maker — back to the place where we remember:

He really does know better than us.

And perhaps that is where peace begins.

Not when everything finally goes according to our plan.

But when we no longer need it to.

 

Proverbs 16:9 says: “In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.”

I love that it doesn't tell us not to plan.

We plan our course.

God establishes our steps.

 

Perhaps the closed door is redirecting us. Perhaps the delay is doing something in us. Perhaps an unexpected encounter is part of someone else's story as much as it is part of ours.

Perhaps we will understand later.

Perhaps we never will.

Faith has to leave room for both.

 

The ‘Yes Lord’ Prayer

And so my prayer is becoming simpler:

I surrender, Lord, to Your will and Your plan. Teach me every day to say yes.

 

Yes when I understand.

Yes when I don't.

Yes when Your way looks exactly like the plan I carefully put together.

And yes when it looks nothing like it.

Yes, Lord, to You. And yes, Lord, to Your will.

Less striving.

Less anxiety about how everything will turn out.

More faithfulness.

More obedience.

More presence.

More joy.

More trust.

 

The Beauty of a Surrendered Life

Maybe this is the beauty of a surrendered life.

It isn't a life without ambition, plans or effort. It isn't giving up and doing nothing because “God will handle it.”

Quite the opposite.

 

It is a life where effort has finally found its proper place.

I do my part and trust God with His. Mine is the effort; the outcome belongs to Him.

I give my best and trust Him with what comes next.

And even when the outcome is not what I hoped for, I trust that He can still work it together for good.

 

Perhaps this is where joy lives.

Perhaps this is where we finally become free enough to enjoy this one beautiful life we have been given instead of spending it desperately trying to control it.

And perhaps this is how we become a blessing to ourselves and the world around us — not by controlling everything, but by faithfully tending the little piece of the world God has entrusted to us.

 

So own your piece.

Play your part well.

Be thoughtful about the ripples your life creates.

Do what you can.

Do it with love.

And when you have done what you can, let go.

Your best efforts are just that — your best efforts.

Trust God with the outcome.

He sees the whole picture.

 

And maybe the beauty of this life was never in knowing how everything would turn out.

 

Maybe it was in learning to faithfully play our part while walking with the One who does.