control

I started this post last Tuesday and I couldn't really get my thoughts together for it and had to keep coming back to it.  I'm still not sure if I made any sense, perhaps it's a work in progress, much like me!   

I am a typical "oldest child", type A personality, driven, rule-following, self-reliant. You name those prototypical oldest child stereotypes and I fit most of them. I like to be in control (and maybe I'm just humoring myself, if so, friends speak up - but for those of you who don't know me or don't know me well, I don't think I'm "controlling", but I like to know what's going to happen). In school I hated group projects because not everyone cared. about making an "A" and I'd usually end up doing most of the work, just to be sure it was done "right". In hindsight so much of that sounds selfish and self-centered, but there you have it - oh, and another thing about me is that I am a horrible liar.

The type A, oldest child in me has been on quite a journey these past few months. While I have always known and "trusted" that God is in control, that belief and trust has been put to the test in a huge and unavoidable way. I have been wrestling with questions like, What is faith? What is trust? What do they look like on a daily basis?  

I can't remember where I heard this, but someone recently said that trust doesn't mean the road ahead or the road behind is all okay, it just means that I promise to walk with you no matter what that road brings; trusting that God will walk next me, has walked next to me each step of the road I'm on.    

 We had our 20 week ultrasound this past Monday and the weekend leading up to it was filled with a spectrum of feelings, from excitement and anticipation to fear and anxiety.  The wait for that appointment was enough to make me sick.  That oldest child in me who wants to know how it's all going to go down and to prepare and be in control was lost!  I had absolutely no say or control over how things would go in that office Monday morning.  As the ultrasound began, my fears were taken over by my joy at seeing a beautiful heart beating, an active baby moving around just like her big sister did on her 20 week ultrasound 3 years ago, and all the measurements coming out "normal".  Worry and anxiety don't change the way things turn out though, so why do I continually return to those feelings?  My worry didn't make the ultrasound go well or cause us to get good news on Monday.  

The more I think about it, the more I see that anxiety as my last ditch effort to control the outcome of something I consciously know that I have zero control over.  Obviously, I need to stay healthy and eat right, take my vitamins, give myself my shots, etc., but so much of what could go wrong is out of my hands.  

God, help me to loosen that grip of control, to live in the light, to see my blessings, to trust and hope in you - to be less of me and more of Jesus.  

I hope that I don't constantly sound like all I think about is the negative, because that is certainly not the case, but these questions plague me and writing about them somehow helps me to make sense of it.