Balance? or Surrender?

I've been preachin' and preachin' -- on this blog and to anyone who would stop and listen -- that this life is all about finding balance. Home and work, family and job, family and ministry, church and ministry, yada, yada, the pull and tug of all of those is constant and unrelenting, so I have often thought and said that it is all about balance.

God has been leading me to understand that I am completely wrong.

This type of balance reminds me of a station the P.E. teachers have at the school where I substitute -- a small plank balanced on a PVC pipe about the diameter of a can of tennis balls. I've actually tried to do this, and have done it without even breaking any part of my body, which is an accomplishment in itself. I have pretty good balance, but to stay on that thing requires every bit of concentration and control I can give. AND I know when I am balanced and when I am not, which is rare when you're talking about the pull between your family and your ministry or your job.

I don't know what caused me to start thinking otherwise, but God very firmly said to me recently, "It's not about balance, it's about total surrender. To me." There is no balance in total surrender. Balance implies that I am completely in control -- the nudge of the Father or the breath of the Holy Spirit is likely to send my PVC pipe rolling and upset the delicate balance I have created in my world. Total surrender allows my day to be ordered by Him and the Holy Spirit, which takes a minute-by-minute surrender and conversation with Him. I don't know that I'm ready for that, I kind of like having the illusion that I am in control of my life and day. But my day goes REALLY wrong when God shows me that I never was in control.

What about my flat tire last week? Maybe I was supposed to come in contact with someone at the tire store. Did I? Nope, just read a book, trying to survive the irritation of MY plan not going how I wanted it. Did I miss what God had for me to do? I'll never know...

So today I shall surrender. My worries, my irritations, my own plans, my family, my ministry, my deadlines. All of it. (Seriously, it kind of makes my pulse race to think of letting it all go -- will it get done? What will happen?) Then I shall laugh to myself ever thinking I had any control of it anyway. And I will trust. None of that will be easy, but I will do that for today. And tomorrow I will get up and try again.

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Gal 2:20