Not my will, but yours be done.

Christians pray that a lot. We also spend even more time asking God what his will even is. Who should we marry, where should we live, what job should we take, etc.

And yet, even when we are pursuing God and what he has for us, I’ve found in my own life that I still want to do it my way.

Here is how this has been playing out for me.

I’m currently in a church planting residency program out of which we will be planting a church. So that’s the goal: to plant a church.

But even though I know big picture what the plan is, lately my thoughts and plans on how to get there have been largely my own doing.

I need to meet with these people, start working on these documents, and planning these events.

I’m confident in where God is leading big picture, but I have largely left him there. And we do this a lot.

Who should I marry? That’s a question everyone asks. Then we start dating someone and sooner or later realize they are “the one” but then leave God out of the details of the relationship. Often ignoring his design for sexual purity and intimacy because we either 1) think God is wrong (but no one wants to admit that) or 2) justify it because “we are going to get married anyway” (or so we think).

One of the most known passages of scripture is Ephesians 2:8-9:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

That’s big picture stuff; our salvation is in Jesus alone. But the next verse is often overlooked:

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Good works that we should walk in them.

God isn’t just concerned about our salvation, he is also concerned about the journey. Preparing steps that we should walk in. Steps that help us become more like Jesus and accomplish his mission of reaching people with the Gospel.

I’m learning to trust God in the smaller steps too, which sometimes is even harder than the big ones.