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What part of your life do you worry about? That brings sadness? Or makes you feel frustrated, lonely, or hopeless? Which of your numbing-to-escape habits makes life worse rather than better? What negative thoughts haunt you at night?
Because we’ve all got issues that bring us pain. At times, we all desperately wonder: “What can I do to feel better?”
Our well-being includes how we are doing emotionally, mentally, socially, personally, and spiritually. There are many steps we can take to improve our wellness and lessen our problems. But there is only one supernatural way to transform our lives.
Think how life would change if we let go of our issues, trust God, and accept peace? That choice has a name: “Surrender.”
Surrender is trusting God for the outcome without knowing if his answer will be what we want, or when it may come, or if we will see the answer or not. Trust may take effort, but surrendering our concerns is the choice that changes everything.
To get in physical shape, we can’t exercise just once or twice. We don’t become proficient playing the guitar or learn to speak another language without work. We train ourselves to get better, and that involves practicing the activity over and over.
It seems like I’ve been practicing how to trust God in some areas for a long time, such as how I think about perfection and control, and I worry too much about performance. I’ve tried to turn those areas over to God many times. Sometimes, it feels like I’m making progress, but then something happens and the worry or shame comes sneaking back into my mind.
I wish this whole trust and surrender thing was easier.
The fact that sometimes my issues come back may sound like failure, but I don’t think so. Trust often works for a while, and I genuinely feel more peace. If worry or shame comes back, I choose to turn it over again, and I trust God a little more.
One of the miraculous things about God is that he can use our weaknesses to do good things, including training us how to stay close to him. He uses our most worrisome issues to help us practice returning our attention to him, sometimes over and over again. Our weakness becomes the vehicle he uses to teach us to depend on his strength rather than rely on our own.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)
Since it seems that trust takes training, can we actually get better at this act of surrender? Yes, if we work at it, we can learn to trust God more readily, and here are three things we can do to practice:
1. Identify an area we need to surrender and admit we can’t manage it on our own. We often approach life backwards from how it really works. We rely on our strength rather than the strength of our all-powerful Creator. We crave control even though peace comes from letting go. We try to manage our problems and miss the transformation of trusting God instead.
Paradoxically, the critical first step to improving our lives is accepting that we can’t do it on our own. We need God’s help.
“I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had no where else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day.” (Abraham Lincoln)
2. Tell God we are giving the issue to him and will trust him no matter what. Faith is a decision: “Do we believe in our loving God or ourselves?” Trust is a choice: “Are we willing to live according to our faith?” Then we do what we can on the things we control (our perspective and choices) and wait calmly on those we don’t (circumstances, people, outcomes).
Imagine the life-changing relief of setting down the things that burden us the most. Then make the choice to trust God.
“Pray as if everything depends on God. Work as if everything depends on you.” (St. Augustine)
3. Keep practicing surrender over and over. God’s timing is often not our timing. But we can still remain hopeful and expectant, because surrender is often when God does his most exciting work. Sometimes, it may be to improve our situation right away, but often he keeps working patiently on something even more important than our circumstances: “Us!”
We desperately want life to go “our way,” but it often does not. The good news is we can still find peace and joy even then.
“Surrender yourself to the Lord, and wait patiently for him.” (Psalm 37:7)
Faith is a decision. Trust is a choice. Our well-being is not at the mercy of circumstances—it just takes training to get better.
Learning to surrender to God is one of the most important life skills we can develop, so the practice is worth it. As we keep placing our trust in God over and over, we find new levels of peace and joy along the way.
Because life is a journey we take one step at a time.
Next Right Steps: Think of one area of your life in which you should train yourself to trust God more.
