You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand that we cannot control most things in this life. For example, we cannot control the weather. Not the rain, nor the snow, nor the wind. We are totally powerless, except of course when we pray, at which point intervention could come from God Almighty who alone is omnipotent and able to change the laws of nature. Otherwise, it is simply a fact of life that there are innumerable things that are beyond our ability, regardless of our genius. I realize we have many limitations but when I heard Pastor Dan Turpin preach a message stating that we have very limited control over our own bodies I did an about-face and thought, "What is he saying? He must be wrong. Of COURSE I have absolute and total control over my own body!"
Wrong. It didn’t take him long at all to show that we have almost NO CONTROL over most parts.
He went on to list a variety of conditions that occur regardless of whether we want them to or not. He pointed out how we cannot command our hearts to stop beating. We cannot tell our stomachs to stop craving or churning. We cannot demand our nerves to stop feeling. We cannot keep our hair from falling out, or for that matter, to even remain the same color. Our skin will not stay smooth and our eyes will not remain bright no matter what we do. And, worst of all, we certainly cannot stop aging.
I had never before considered the sheer reality behind these simple facts. It was a bit distressing and I found it very unamusing. I ended up thinking about this for days and finally decided that it needed to be in my next article.
As is often the case, my life seems to be on ‘fast forward’. Organizing my speaking engagements for April and May plus preparing to transport almost everything I own to Canada for the next six months, amongst a million other things, wiped me out totally. Since I only had a set amount of time for each and every task I began writing this article immediately. The only problem was that I ran into a brick wall right about here. I had NO IDEA of what I wanted to say past this point. Knowing that it is useless to try to be creative when I’m completely exhausted, I decided to take a much needed nap.
Using all the faith that I could muster, I whispered an imperceptible yet very compelling prayer to God as I lay down and closed my eyes, "Lord, you KNOW how much I have to accomplish this week and you KNOW that I need to finish this article so I am believing that you could show me what to write even in my sleep --- because Lord --- I need a nap soooo badly!"
About thirty minutes later I awoke out of a very deep sleep to the sound of Doris Day singing "Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be". My husband was watching, ‘The Man Who Knew Too Much’ in the living room. I shot out of the bed like a lightening bolt and raced to my keyboard. This was the answer to my prayer. Doris Day was WRONG! I’m certain it must have been a very nice movie, but the message was all wrong. We are not to assume that ‘whatever will be will be’ but that we play an integral role in determining our destiny. As Pastor Turpin stated, "God has given us FREE WILL. It belongs to us. God does not control it and the principalities and powers of darkness do not control it --- we do".
By exercising that free will we choose our future both in this life and in the next. The choices and decisions we make have consequences. Our destiny does not consist of a chain of events that are just happenstance. We can choose to follow and obey God thereby allowing HIM to orchestrate the events (For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. Then shall ye call upon me and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you’ Jer. 29: 11 & 12 KJV) or we can choose our own path and live in rebellion to Him. As Dan Turpin so eloquently expounded, "Atrocities happen when our free will is not in tune with the nature of God. People become proud, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, angry and lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. Our only hope is to surrender our greatest possession, our will and give it to God. The body and the spirit belong to God but we determine their fate (1 Cor. 6:20) The human will is God’s ONLY when we surrender and give it to Him."
Might I add, if we choose to yield ourselves to the Spirit of God then the fruit of the Spirit --- love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance (Gal. 5:22 KJV) is developed and manifested in our life and in everything we do and those things are paramount in shaping our destiny.
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