Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.
James 4:15-17 CSB
It was a month before our wedding when I decided we should take ballroom dancing lessons- because obviously there was nothing else going on in our lives at that time and we had all the time in the world to learn a new skill. I called around and found a place that could offer us classes at a reasonable price and the teacher thought we would be able to learn enough steps to fill the entirety of the song we had chosen for our first dance.
We both enjoyed the classes- I had taken traditional dance classes from the time I was a toddler until I graduated from high school. My husband loves music and likes to dance at weddings and other such events. Once we had learned enough steps to string together so that we could “dance,” we ran into a small glitch.
I was trying to lead. The woman cannot lead in ballroom style dancing. The man’s steps are less complicated, because he is the one listening to the music and signaling the woman on what steps she will take next. The woman on the other hand just has to remember the steps and heed the cues given to her by her partner. She doesn’t have to think about timing or what comes next- she only has to trust her partner and focus on him. The teacher told us what the problem was, that I needed to let him lead, and just do the steps. This system would be good for us because while I can pick up the choreography quickly, I cannot hear music. My husband-to-be, on the other hand, could hear the music and would keep our timing strong. All I had to do was give up control.
It sounds simple- just let go! But it was hard to give up control and stop trying to lead, even though I knew my husband-to-be was better equipped for that role. After several times of running the dance and seeing the teacher flinch as I would ignore my husband’s cue and start to take the lead again I was finally able to surrender to my partner. And guess what happened- I lived! And our dancing improved.
How often do we do the same thing with God? We hear Him gently nudging us to let go and release control and we fight it. We hear Him gently whispering to us that He knows best and we must surrender, but still we try to do things our way. How miraculous, when we relinquish the control that we never really had, into the hands of the One who created us that we then experience peace contentment that had been escaping us when we were so busy trying to do it ourselves. Funny how well things work when we submit to the creator of the world and do what He says.