Do not be afraid

Do you ever get the sense that someone is trying to tell you something? I have spent a lot of time, especially in the last five or so years, wishing and hoping and praying that God would speak to me, give me direction, explain a few things - explain everything. I've always been a woman with a plan (usually at least a ten year plan) and I find it really difficult to not know what is coming next. For most of my life, I have fought, hard, to maintain as much control as possible over those aspects of living I thought I could control. I worked hard and tried my best, and expected things to turn out well because I had always been told that if I did what I was supposed to, if I did what was expected of me, I would get what I was striving for. 

And it worked, for a while. I accumulated degree after degree, and kept waiting for the happiness to kick in. I did all the things I was supposed to, and could not understand why that unspecified, nebulous something wonderful I was waiting for didn't seem to be materialising. Then the concrete markers of success began to fail me; or rather, I felt that I was beginning to fail - at life in general. I couldn't seem to achieve enough any more. After years of being a super-achiever, I seemed to hit a brick wall. My best was no longer good enough, for myself or for those I had been trying to please. Worst of all, I didn't really know why I was doing any of it. 

So, I started asking myself what I wanted (I'm not sure I know the answer yet by the way). And that led me, mercifully quickly, to asking what God wanted of and for me. Which led me to pleading for a word, a sign, something! Because discernment is hard (as so many of you know)! It is hard to try to hear what God might be saying to you, to listen to what you know or are discovering about yourself, to face what others have to tell you about yourself. What if you are asked to go in a direction you are not inclined to follow? What if it makes you uncomfortable, or doesn't match the plans and expectations you had for yourself? What if people say things to you about yourself you find difficult to just to hear, let alone truly confront? But how will you change and grow if you don't face these things? And you know what the really challenging thing is?

"In obedience to discernment, more discernment will come. We need to be attentive and alert in order to hear and understand God's call and then act, knowing that God blesses even our mistakes." (Unknown)

Well! That's all very well, but it's really challenging for a control-freak, type A personality like myself! And therein lies the rub: control. Or rather, relinquishing control. Anyone attempting any form of discernment (spiritual, directional, practical etc) is sooner or later going to come across some form of advice on getting out of one's comfort zone, making a leap of faith, letting go of whatever you've been holding on to so tightly... you get the picture. I don't know about you, but I find letting go absolutely terrifying. I have often thought that if I could get to the place where I can genuinely hand everything over to God, I would be so much happier. 

Because what a wonderful idea, what a generous offer! Hand it all over to God. Trust in Him. How positively restful! But much as I want to, I just. Can't. Do. It. I fight to retain some semblance of control, even as life proves to me how futile that is. And for me, what it all boils down to is fear. Fear of letting go, fear of failing, fear of the unknown, fear of disappointing everyone, fear that I am going to make some horrible, catastrophic, irreversible mistake. Fear that I am somehow going to lose everyone and everything. Nameless, bottomless, all-consuming fear.

Which is madness (but very human). What do I, who am so loved by my Father that He made the ultimate sacrifice for me, really have to fear? Sure, nasty things happen, but that is not the sum of the human experience. The cross did not make Christ's life less. 

So, what has God been saying to me? I haven't got the answer I've been praying for - but that might be because I'm asking the wrong question, or because I haven't learnt how to listen. There is still a lot of noise in my head and my heart drowning out the still small voice of the One who loves me. But what I have been told, again and again, in one form or another, is this: Do not be afraid. In preparing this blog post alone I randomly came across the following (and quite a bit more):

"Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God." (Corrie Ten Boom)

"All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen." (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

"Do not be afraid. Our fate cannot be taken from us; it is a gift." (Dante Alighieri, Inferno)

It might not be the answer I was looking for (I do so love specifics). But it is what I need to hear, to comfort me, to strengthen me, and to move me forward. It is what I keep hearing, and so it is what I feel I have to share with you. Do no be afraid.

"None of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet still we go forward. Because we trust. because we have Faith." (Paulo Coelho, Brida).