Learning to have God be in control

Hello from the warmer parts of the world this is Steve.

It is time for a “what have we learned lately” blog. So here goes. Pretty much for the last 6 months I (we but in different ways) have been learning how to let God take control of my life. I guess it goes back even further than 6 months because when God switched us from France to Cote d’Iviore a year ago we had pretty much decided God didn’t want us to go overseas and when we prayed specifically for double the support we had and didn’t expect it, God provided. Even then for a moment we questioned because our minds were set on staying where we were, but when God gives you the sign you ask for, you should not complain. So we had to continue support raising which we had been doing for over 2 years at that point and were not excited about, but God provided and everything came together as he wanted it to.


For the year and a half before left both Jess and I worked, paid off all our student loans and started saving because that is the responsible thing to do. About a month before my job ended and in the middle of some uncertainty of when we would actually get to leave I felt God calling us to give the money we had been saving. It took me about a week to come to terms with this because without really thinking about it both Jess and I had made plans with this money and it was our security. So God, wanting us to depend on him for everything (like doing support raising wasn’t enough…), wanted us to give almost all of our savings to our future ministry. So then I had to tell Jess that God was telling me this, it took me another week to do that because it sounds completely crazy, right? But I did and at first she thought I was crazy, but then got on board since it was God not me. And after we did this there was more discussion about not leaving when we thought we would and maybe having to stay in the States longer, but we only had God to rely on so we knew it was his timing when we made it to Africa.

Another lesson I had to learn in the process of letting God have control of my life was with letting God have my appearance. So most people know (and some have very strong opinions) that I have my ears pierced and have gauges. I really like them and they are unique. So God starts picking on my earrings and telling me to take them out to fit into this culture and not be a stumbling block to others and just generally listen to him. So as usual, I put it off because I don’t want to change. At about the same time, Jess has a similar thing going on with her nose ring and when she felt herself getting an attitude about it with God she just went and took it out because she knew that is what she needed to do. The very next day she went and visited Centre Providence where Stephanie works and the girls there had an hour long lecture on nose rings (in this culture mostly prostitutes wear them), she was quite thankful she had listened to God when she did. As for me, I waited longer because I’m stubborn, but I finally took them out and they are closing up nicely (you were wrong about them never closing mom). I haven’t seen anything come from me taking them out, but I followed what God wanted which is what is important.

I am quite sure God will continue to show me areas of my life where I am still trying to keep control and really just need to let God have it because he has better plans. So I will leave you with Jess’ motto: “if I don’t want to, I know I should.”