It is Sunday morning. I awaken at 5:00, thinking about getting ready for church. I am not at peace. I don’t wish to go to church feeling as I do; but it’s Sunday morning, and going to church is what I do on Sunday morning. My friends will expect me to be there and think that something is wrong if I’m not.
Listening from Within
My husband and I are visiting Bowling Green, Ohio, where we lived for over 30 years before moving away. Waldemar had expressed the desire to visit Amish country and buy some garlic knocks
to take home with us. He wanted to go home via our son’s house and have him make a bonfire to roast the knocks
as we had so often done when he was a child and we were camping. We had decided some days ago that we would go yesterday. But night before last we looked at weather.com and saw that the high temperature for the day was to be 56 degrees and that it was to be mostly cloudy
and 17mph winds. Since our reason for choosing this time of year for our visit was to see the autumn colors, it didn’t seem like a very good choice to go yesterday. We saw that Monday was supposed to be sunny
and 64 degrees; so we went to bed believing that we would go Monday.
Halting Between Two Opinions
For some time now, the still small voice inside has been speaking to me about this Scripture:
1Kings 18:21 And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.
Government of My Life
Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
If the government of my life is to be upon His shoulder, I must stop making decisions based on reason or duty. If I know that of mine own self I can do nothing (John 5:30), then my total reliance must be upon the
still small voice(1Kings 19:12) inside. Because I can do NOTHING of mine own self, that means I cannot even distinguish the still small voice. How can I obey what I cannot even distinguish? This is where the government is on HIS shoulders. I cannot rely upon myself for ANYTHING. I totally depend upon HIM —the SPIRIT that I AM. I just do what I feel to do, say what I feel to say, as my mind is stayed on HIM —not on what I ought to do or say or what is the reasonable thing to do or say.
Isaiah 26:3 Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.
And no matter what the outcome, I don’t begin questioning and second guessing what I did or said. No, I keep my mind stayed on God and my faith in His promises to walk and talk in me (2Corinthians 6:16). I never again take the government of my life upon my own shoulders. Some trust in horses and chariots, some in their own ability to make the right decisions; but I trust in the name (nature) of God (Psalms 20:7) —the nature that is ready and willing to take full responsibility for running (guiding, directing) that which He begot out of Himself (James 1:18).
What I haven’t heretofore realized is that when I take the government of my life upon my own shoulders (which are in no way equipped to bear that burden) as did the prodigal son, my Father doesn’t interfere. He just patiently and eagerly awaits my return —my coming to myself, coming to the realization that I don’t have to remain in the pig sty of self indulgence which I’ve dug for myself, nor yet in the chains of duty that the elder brother put upon himself. We are all free to live the life of abundance when we can hear our Father say, All that I have is yours
(Luke 15:11-32).
But none of us will know this freedom until we understand what it means to let the government of our lives be upon our Father’s shoulder.