eyes to see, ears to hear, & a heart to listen

Not My Will, but Thy Will

I'm so confused
I know I heard you loud and clear
So, I followed through
Somehow I ended up here
I don't wanna think
I may never understand
That my broken heart is a part of your plan
When I try to pray
All I've got is hurt and these four words

Thy will be done

I know you're good
But this don't feel good right now
And I know you think
Of things I could never think about
It's hard to count it all joy
Distracted by the noise
Just trying to make sense
Of all your promises
Sometimes I gotta stop
Remember that you're God
And I am not

Hillary Scott & The Scott Family - Thy Will

Thy will be done. Four key words Jesus said when He was teaching the disciples how to pray. He said, "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven." Ultimately, we should be looking for God's will to be done in everything. Yet, most of our prayers are simply a laundry list of tasks we want Him to take care of right NOW, and in the manner we believe is best for things to play out. We go to God as if He is a genie in a bottle, fully expecting, sometimes demanding, that He fulfill our every wish.

Why do we behave this way? Why do we try so hard to control all our outcomes? If we trust there is a God to pray to, and we have faith that He is good and loves us, why can we not have faith in His will being done when we go to Him with our prayers and petitions?

In my humble opinion, the most difficult thing we must do when we pray, is to trust. We struggle, as Carrie Underwood sings, to let Jesus take the wheel. In our fallen human nature, it’s not uncommon for us to believe that we know what the best solution or outcome should be for the various petitions we take to God.

Therefore, our prayers often sound more like suggestions of our ideal and desired outcomes than humble requests made from a place of letting go and trusting that God, our Father and creator knows what the best answer should be for our prayers.

Trust involves letting go, of our will, our desires, and our expectations, fully trusting that the one who created us, who is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, truly has our best interest at heart. God knows what we need better than we do ourselves, and way before we ask.

The kind of trust I am talking about is childlike, like a little child who can’t swim, jumping into their daddy’s arms in a swimming pool, or jumping from a high place into their parent’s arms. They have full confidence they will be caught and cared for. That’s how God wants us to trust Him.

Jesus said in Matthew 18:3, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” There’s an element of innocence, total trust, and blind faith that we possess when we are children and God wants us to come to him with that same trust when we pray. Thy will, NOT my will, be done.

I am 57 years old. I have prayed for as long as I can remember. I have heard a million sermons, lessons, podcasts, and read books about prayer and how to pray, etc., but it has only been in the last few years where I have truly started to “get it.”

It has only been the past few years where I can honestly say that I have genuinely been trying to fully surrender to God’s will, laying things at the foot of the cross, and saying, not my will Lord, but yours.  

Friends, God is showing up and He is opening my eyes to see how He is answering some of those prayers. He is opening my ears so that I am more in tune to hear His response, and He has opened my heart to discern when He is providing for me. Identifying answers to our prayers, requires that we let go of our preset expectations of what those answers will be, and allow God to help us discern when, how, and if He decides to answer our prayers.

For this people's heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed; lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’ Acts 28:27 ESV

Fully surrendering does not guarantee our prayers will be answered exactly as we pray for them to be, or when or exactly as we desire them to play out, but here is what I have learned in my own prayer journey as I am learning to surrender to HIS WILL being done over my will.

1.     Situations play out better than I prayed for them to because God knows the full story. I don’t.

2.    HIS timing is always way better than mine.

3.    Most often a NO, or unanswered prayer makes a lot of sense later down the road.

4.    When I am surrendered to His will, God opens my eyes, ears, and heart so that I might recognize and absorb those moments when He is answering prayers I have prayed over for years. He makes sure I don’t miss them.

Letting go and trusting God with your prayers will free you. It is freedom from trying to control things you have no control over. It’s comforting not having to feel so responsible for things you don’t know everything about, even if it is your own story.