Letting Go of Control Part 1

        Do you find that sometimes it is easier 'to serve God and do for Him' (which is good) than it is to sit at His feet in prayer, to seek His face, and quietly listen to Him (which is better)? 

        Are you afraid of what He might say to you? Has He already given you instructions that you are currently resisting?   Maybe He has asked you to do some hard thing that is outside of your comfort zone, or something that you don't fully understand the reason behind the instruction, so you’ve unconsciously decided that you just won’t listen for awhile- maybe that thing will go away because ‘surely He wasn’t really asking me to do that'.  Or has He asked you to give up something that, until He asked, you never knew meant so much to you?

Oh, that age old question, 'Hath God really said?'  

      There was a leper who didn’t like Elisha’s instructions to be healed.  He was told to go and wash in the river seven times (2 Kings 5).  Naaman was furious because he had different expectations and other rivers were better- could he not wash in them?  He wanted to do it his own way.  The means of being healed weren’t up to par for him so he had a choice, would he go- would he obey? 

       His servant said something very profound “..had the prophet told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it?  How much more then, when he says to you, ‘Wash, and be clean’?”

       Do we not, in a sense, have this same response?  We come to God for help, to hear His instructions, and instead of hearing some 'great thing', we hear, 'Wash and be clean'- 'let go of your control and idols'- and in response, we decide to close our ears and to work harder.

      Did the leper really want to be healed, enough that he would do what he’d rather not do or didn’t understand?  Or would he forfeit the miracle?  Naaman washed "according to the word of the man of God", and "his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child and he was clean.”  And he responded, “Behold now, I know that there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel…”  

      There is no other god, no idol, no comfort, none of your own ideas of how you want things to go- there is nothing- worth missing all that God is.

 Oh may we not forfeit the miracle.  Choose to believe and obey His instructions.​ You know that it's Him because it won't go away.  Listen to Him, obey, even though you don't understand, and expectantly watch for the consequences of that obedience.