“Jesus, take the wheel
Take it from my hands
Cause I can’t do this on my own;

I’m letting go
So give me one more chance
To save me from this road I’m on
Jesus, take the wheel.”

Sometimes we hold on to control until we have no choice but to allow God to do it. He is our Master, our Guide and I could go on and on… He’s knows what’s best for us and the quicker we realize that the better for us and Him because then God can use us for His glory.

We are so like the Israelites and i must admit i am like them too, more so in the past. I think that is because i was so busy doing with what i want in life than to seek God most of the time. I used to forget the answered prayers and even His divine intervention. However, when i make it a point/habit to be close to His Word daily i realised how much God had been with me in the past. It is just in my busyness that i never gave it a thought. The easiest thing is to be a complainer and losing sight of all that He had done for me.

I am so grateful that God has been so gracious and merciful to me even though i have not put Him first in my life before. God is still performing miracles in our lives. Do we give ourselves the time to stay close to His Word, reflect and think about what God has done and is doing in our lives …??? I try to remind myself.

When we seek God daily, we know He is indeed a GREAT AND TRUE GOD. He is worthy of our praise and reverence in all circumstances.

For instance, my husband is going to start working nights and I’m not at all happy about it. I feel hurt that he is going to be living on a different schedule than me and we won’t see each other much. I feel betrayed by his choice and powerless to change it.

Yet he is very hurt by my reaction. In his mind, I am betraying him by not being loving and supportive of what he feels he must do to provide for our family.

Our ultimate trust must be in God. Yes, we trust people to a point in this life, but even a parent, child, sibling or spouse can and will hurt us at times. And at some point, we will cause pain to someone who loves us.

Jesus loves us so much that He laid down his life to make a way for us to have eternal life, but He did not entrust Himself to men. John 2:24-25

This is why Paul is thankful for Jesus Christ who sets us free from slavery to sins. Those who are in Christ will not follow our sinful nature instead allow ourselves to be controlled by the Spirit. So, all those who use this example to explain away their sin are not born of God’s Spirit and therefore, can readily relate to Paul’s past life.

Another pet excuse many often use is King David. The thinking is, David was an adulterer, liar and murderer and still God called him a man after His heart. So? Does this give us the license to lie, cheat, and kill? Some bluntly state: “I was born this way”. Well, the Bible says we are all born this way in sin and also teaches us that those who have been born of God do not continue in a sinful lifestyle.

Others place the blame for sinful lifestyle on their abusive parents and grandparents. If we go by that reasoning, then all our sins can be traced to our very first parents- Adam and Eve. God knew people will use this as an excuse and so in all wisdom He provided us with the sinless second Adam. When we put on Christ, we put off the past and no longer think about ways to indulge our sinful desires.

Finally, the best educated excuse out there is: this is not a sin but a disease. Wonder how Christians can concoct such concepts. If this is the case, then in the list of sins (Galatians 5:19-21) why are diseases like leprosy or cancer not included? Point is: no matter how we see it, a sin is a sin is a sin. And the smug rationale “everybody else is doing it” is because of the false teaching that assures, a good God is not going to send everyone to hell. Whom are we trying to fool?

Let us not be deceived to say “we all sin, we are all growing”. As long as we make excuses, we will neither learn nor grow but will be ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Unless we admit that we are wrong, we cannot receive freedom from guilt, depression and condemnation. Whether we are kids or adults, instead of excuse-making we need to humbly admit, confess, and turn away from our sins to experience God’s forgiveness. This is the humility that identifies a genuine child of God.

Once, I had to literally drag my friend to the testing center. She had caught this dreadful exam fever from others who went back home without taking the test. Don’t know how I managed to persuade her that day. Surely it was God who gave me the wisdom that encouraged her to face the finals. She did pass and successfully earned her degree.

And Jennifer, you are right; fear can be contagious. Look how it infected and killed an entire generation—who were kept them from receiving their promised inheritance. The negative reports of the fearful spies discouraged the nation of Israel. Similarly, negative thinking that says we cannot cope or it is too hard to follow God’s law and we are going to fail—demoralizes the entire church. If we hang out with fearful believers leading defeated Christian lives, then fear will keep us from possessing our spiritual inheritance.

The great Physician’s Rx for fear is faith (Matthew 8:26). Faith gives us courage and comes from hearing and believing God’s words. The spirit of fear is not from God but from the enemy who leads us to doubt God. Fear therefore comes from believing the words of the devil and is another face of unbelief in God. When we trust self and place confidence in self or anyone other than God, we live in constant fear of losing our health, our lives, our loved ones, our jobs, and our homes.

However, when we trust God and His love, it helps us develop immunity against fear. For Christians to have no fear does not mean that we feel invincible. We are simply confident that God will surely see us through the terrors of the darkest night. Also, God’s presence is among people of faith like Joshua and Caleb. Their godly wisdom will guide and encourage us during scary situations. This is how we put into practice all the precious “fear not” promises that God has given us in almost every book in the Bible.