Out of Control

“In contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.” Galatians 5: 22-23

Have you ever seen a little kid lose it? I mean really, truly become out of control? They are screaming, crying, rolling around…and they can’t stop themselves. They can’t even necessarily remember what set them off they are so far gone. Or maybe we can still lose control as a teen-ager or an adult: screaming, yelling, cursing. Doing things we don’t want to do, blaming others, hurting the ones we love the most. Or not being able to stop ourselves from getting on facebook, texting, looking at pornography, taking drugs or alcohol. And you know the most difficult thing to deal with when we lose control? The sense of spinning, surging, reckless chaos that clouds our minds and floods our emotions that leaves us feeling so fearful and helpless.

Self-control is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit. It is one of the identifiers of a Christian living in tune with the promptings of the Spirit. And the key to it is letting go. Letting go of the lie that tries to convince us we actually have control over our lives. Because somewhere deep down, if we are willing to be honest with ourselves, we know we have very little control over most things in our lives. We can’t control the future or the past. We can’t control when we die or how. We can’t control the weather, natural disasters or the stock market. We can’t control our boyfriend, girlfriend, spouse, mother, father, children or friends. We can’t control whether people will accept us or like us…et cetera, et cetera. I could go on and on.

But if we let go to the power of the Holy Spirit, He can give us the grace to surrender our lack of self-control to the order and peace that comes from God alone. The self-control of God is the antidote to the meaningless chaos that rules so many lives. Self-control is living in authentic freedom instead of the “freedom-without-restraint” lie so prominent in our world today. Self-control is living without fear, without helplessness, without the reckless anarchy that comes from being out of control. We let go through prayer, through sacrifice, through not catering to every whim and desire of our hearts and by putting others’ needs before our own.

Ultimately, by giving our lives and all that we cannot control, to the One who is in control, allows us to live in the joy, peace and freedom of His Spirit. Like an out-of-control child held in the strong, loving arms of their father, so we surrender ourselves to the will of our Father in heaven and trust in His plan and providence for us.

Dear Jesus, help me to live in right relationship with You by surrendering all that I am and all that I have to the authority and control of Your Spirit. And through this surrender, may I come to be fully embraced by the loving arms of the Father and dwell in the peace of His protection. Amen.