Cease.

Humans are a funny thing. But mostly because actions reveal what's inside, who we are, and how ridiculous we are. Right now, I put around 500 miles on my car every week. I drive a lot. And I drive the same stretch of road a lot. Most every day I drive a section of highway where two lanes become one, where one lane meets the other. There's a large sign that reads "right lane ends." Every time, without fail, there's a car that flies by, tries to get ahead, almost to the point of being reckless.  Like yesterday, I was most certainly now in a one lane, two lanes had ended, and yet a silly, crazed human comes out of nowhere and pushes past me. Because getting just one car further in the line up is of utmost importance. Really. But I haven't been able to get this out of my head all week. And no it's not fear. Unfortunately I sometimes don't have enough of that. For some reason my Creator really likes to use analogies in my life, and some weeks He has me thinking what the perfect analogy would be for a given situation.

Mid week, The verse "Cease striving and know that I am God." Stuck out like a tack on bare feet, lit up like a neon sign. I had to go look it up. Call me the worst of all Bible readers, but I actually didn't realize that this verse and "Be still and know that I am God" were the same. Sometimes I have had to be still and trust. But this week, He was nudging me to cease striving. Stop pushing my own agenda, striving toward my own plans, to try to make things happen on my own, going about things the wrong way, not being patient, struggling to trust once again. I need to bring to an end my fight to be in control. I try to get ahead, pass God up, but it doesn't get me anywhere. It leaves me in the same place where I was, and maybe thinking that I'm doing better than others. How we can dare to think that we have a better plan than God or ask why He's taking so long to accomplish what we think should happen now is beyond me. But we do it over and over again. Silly humans. We try to get ahead, try to speed things up, strive to do things our way. Independent and unreliant on our Creator we end of being reckless. This generally doesn't usually work out for us very well. All God asks of us is to cease striving. Rest in who He is, know that He has your back, He's got whatever situation you're going through under control, and He, in His timing, will work all things together for the good of those who are called according to His purpose. Know that He is God. Think on who He is.

As I'm travelling along, and God asks me to come follow along His path, will I surrender? Even when I think that I'm in the right lane and and it seems, well, right? Will I cease? Yield? Give way to what He has in store. Knowing full well that it is good. By that, our Creator is exalted. Worship is surrender. Surrender is worship.