Why begins any spiritual journey, but surrender only happens when every belief you have about your life is interrogated and laid bare. When you humbly understand your limitations as a human. While acknowledging the self-deception that you’re in control of your world or even your own life.
This is the moment when you meet your mortality, when death is no longer theoretical. Past distractions of pleasure, work, or responsibility can no longer protect your heart from understanding you too shall pass from this world. Your consciousness naked and exposed; cognizant that everything under the sun will wither and die including you and whatever ideas you have about “your” power.
Faith is the antidote to our delusion of control. Helping our hearts comprehend the Truth, that we control very little in this life; neither proceedings nor persons. Even our own autonomy has limitations. While we are creatures who can comprehend improbable possibility, we are also incapable of the impossible even if everyone wants to rule the world.
This righteous realization of my own limitations and my limitless worrying about life, shattered whatever faith I had in my own abilities to control every aspect of my life including those in my life. Coming to understand I cannot even add a single hour to my life or anyone’s life for that matter. Comprehending this fundamental fact led me to believe in a power much higher than I. Convinced this false sense of control is one of life’s greatest illusions because it entered the world through the lies that spoiled Eden.
Believing that we will be like God to discern what is good and what is evil. That the creature comprehends more than its Creator. That the finite is greater than the Infinite. That evil knows more than Love. God is love.
History and honest self-reflection makes clear that we often and will always miss the mark in truly knowing what is good and what is evil. Unable to let go and trust in God, because we are anxious about our own self-preservation and power. Creating a false reality that will always lead to chaos because we lack authority. God alone controls life; ours, yours and my own.
This false faith that humans are in control, is in conflict with a culture in which the center of authority lies within the self as opposed to outside of the self. That the world and everyone in the world will bend to our desires and wishes. That we have dominion over death because we were given life. That we can take life because we’re in a position of power even if it’s fleeting. That everything and everyone can be controlled by us and for us.
This was my faith for most of my life because my faith was in myself. I alone can change the world, and I alone can change other people. Even if my own self-interest was intertwined in my desire for control. Even the people I claimed to love eventually became objects.
Believing that if I implement the right amount of sticks and carrots I can change anyone’s behavior. If I generate enough inspiration and perspiration I can control any situation. If I just try harder I can determine my destiny.
What makes all these self-affirmation statements so dangerously deceptive is that there is a kernel of truth in them. We are each responsible for our own lives and only us. We alone control what we do, and what we won’t do. We are loved by God, and genuine love always requires autonomy.
But the Truth is we cannot control the future. We cannot control other people, we cannot evade suffering or death, and we cannot continue to believe that we are the moral center of the universe. We are creatures made by the Creator, not creatures who made a creator.
Trust in God alone is and has always been hard for humans; particularly people like me who want to control all aspects of their life. Who think they can slay other people’s demons. Who only want the best, so we do what we think is best even when our insight is tied to what we desire.
When Jesus told Peter, “Get behind me, Satan!” He knew that Peter loved him, but Peter was blind to his own need. Incapable of understanding what God needed to do to rescue Peter and all humanity from death because God so loves the world. In the end, God controls all our lives because God is our Creator.
Faith is teaching me to be God’s child, not the parent. Learning that love can only be about encouraging my brothers and sisters as opposed to trying to control them. That love is about allowing people to make their own journey while supporting their stumbles. That God alone controls the world, a daily lesson reinforced by my cat.
Peace. God loves you.
If you want to learn more about how my spiritual awakening came to be, you can read about it in Finding God in Vegas: A Gen X Spiritual Awakening; available on Amazon and across all platforms in print or electronic or audio.