The Lesson in the Van Key

Lately my issue with “control” has been beating me over the head.  Most often my strongest reactions in life stem from an inability to control my circumstances or the people around me.  My friends helped me realize all this over a coffee therapy date.

Circumstances are hard enough to control, but people can be worse, right?  Because shouldn’t they know better than to defy my expectations?

Maybe a sibling doesn’t respond to me as quickly as I’d like, or my parents have to cut a visit short, and I flare up with feelings of resentment or irritability. Maybe someone is driving recklessly on the highway and part of me almost wishes they’d get into an accident and learn their lesson. That’s a fair way to control someone, right?  Or sometimes my son will. not. listen. My best laid discipline plans have actually managed to provoked him to more rebellion, so I fly off the handle with frustration.  Or maybe I disagree with someone and my reaction is to control them in my mind, spending needless hours plotting how to fix their issue.  And I’m not actually any better off for all these reactions.  I’m not any closer to controlling anything.

And maybe God was thinking to Himself that I haven’t really been letting go of my control issue very well.  Probably because at some point this week I tried to control Him too.  Apparently the friends and coffee thing didn’t quite cut it, so he gave me a weird object lesson with my van instead.

On a rainy day I decided to take my kids to McDonalds playplace.  My daughter always makes friends instantly when we go there, and for the most part everyone was having a blast…except my youngest son who couldn’t quiiiite get his little legs up the plastic steps.  So when food and redirection were failing, I finally decided to call it a day and rally the troops back outside to the car.

Did I mention it was raining?

Somehow crossing the parking lot always feels like herding little distracted sheep, and by the time we got to the van my joy was just as soggy as my hair.  Then I saw that the van was locked…why would I lock the van when it’s raining?  Imbecile.  I contained the kids while fumbling for keys and pressed the unlock button.  Nothing happened.  “UNLOCK”.  Nothing again.

Are you kidding me?  We have one of those new electronic keys that won’t manually unlock a car so if the button wasn’t working I was in trouble.  Increasingly wet and frustrated, I hit the lock button instead.  I heard a beep.  So I tried “unlock” again but nothing happened.  I tried “lock” once more and realized the beep sounded a bit distant.  Something was off.

Great gravy- I looked inside the van and it wasn’t mine!  Same color.  Same model.  Same stinkin’ dealer.  But my van was two spaces over.  And I probably hadn’t locked it, but apparently it was a good thing the other mom locked hers.  I was honestly too relieved to feel all that sheepish.

Anyway, I just thought it was a funny story, till I started thinking about control again.  Whenever I get worked up, angry, or bitter about someone ELSE, it’s like me trying to use my van key remote to unlock a vehicle that isn’t mine.  It’s not productive- it’s not helpful- it’s actually rather silly.

The only thing my key can control is my own vehicle- the only thing I can control is my own self.

But, self-control- that hardly sounds satisfying.  All the world is a mess around me and I’m supposed to control just…myself?

Still, I looked up the word “control” in the Bible and it turns out I’m never commanded to control others.  I’m not commanded to control my husband, my kids, my friends.  Apparently “others-control” is not a fruit of the Spirit.  But self-control is.

2 Peter 1:5-9* says to “make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.  For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.  But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.” (NIV)

So self-control is a piece of what it means to follow God- and without it I’m likely to be ineffective and unproductive, nearsighted and blind.  Makes sense though.  Spending all my time trying to control others doesn’t help them, and it only makes me angry.  Still- it’s not easy.  Self-control is like a muscle I have to work out again and again, and I feel a little worse each time I fail at it.  I should be getting good by now, right?

That’s when I have to remember that even my self-control is fueled not by myself- but by the Spirit.  In Galatians 5 verse 16 Paul says, “walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.” and in verses 22-23 “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (NIV)

In order for the Spirit to develop the fruit of self-control in my I have to learn to walk with Him.  And that’s kind of a daily thing.  Not something I ever master fully, never something I do without Him.  In a strange way, self-control is actually more about being controlled by God.

I guess that’s good and bad news, because seriously I just want to control something already.  But this is the journey I’m on and I’d love to hear some of your practical stories of learning self-control in your own life.  (Because I’m pretty much at square one.)

*Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.