Control

 

God wants you to have the freedom to be in control of your life. However, you may remember the phrase “one nation, under God.” In thinking of the individual’s life, we would do well to look at ourselves as “one person, under God.” The other aspect of this has to do with remembering who is in charge. It is God’s creation, it is His world, and He is the one who makes the rules. The world is His and all that is in it. As the psalmist says, “It is he who made us, and we are his.” (Psalm 100:3)

What flows from the fact He is God and we are not, is that we are to be under His “lordship.” Or in other words, do things as He says. He made life, it seems we would understand He is the one who knows best how it all works. In His direction to us, as He outlined it to Adam and Eve, there are two sides to His instructions. One side is the freedom we have to enjoy life and all that He has created. The other is a way of living that is to be avoided. Listen to His words to Adam and Eve.

“And the LORD God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.’” (Genesis 2:16,17)

He gave them freedom to enjoy life and the fruits of life He made for them. But he told them they needed to stay away from the tree that symbolized the position of Godhood. The knowledge of good and evil was something God Himself was to know, and mankind was to be protected from. In short, we were to be protected from playing the role that only God can play. We were made to be the creation, not the creator. We were made to obey Him, not dictate our own rules. And in doing so, we would avoid death and separation, and the experience of “good and evil.” It could have been “all good,” if we had only obeyed.

So choosing to live life under God, not trying to be equal or over Him, is a wise choice. He made life, and he best knows how we should live it. Submitting to Him is for our benefit because He seeks to protect us.

From Love, Receive and Obey, by Dr. Henry Cloud