Your Will Be Done

I was texting with a friend recently who was waiting on test results after a scan showed some abnormalities. When I responded, I instinctively texted, “I’m praying that the results come back completely clean, if the Lord wills…”

I stared at my unsent text and then…delete, delete, delete, delete.

I’m praying that the results come back clean, and I left it at that.

That same week I went through some testing for hereditary cancers. Because cancer is so prevalent in my extended family, my doctor thought this was wise, so I didn’t give it much thought until I began answering the lengthy questionnaire and considered what my future may or may not hold. “Lord, keep my body clear of cancer…”

I felt my heart tug. If it be your will, Lord, was how I wanted to freely and confidently conclude that prayer, but I felt a sense of fear saying it. If the Lord wills for me to battle cancer or any other illness, I don’t want it. So, do I really want His will to be done?  

To some extent, relenting to the Lord’s will is difficult for any believer. We’re finite. We’re unable to control what we wish we could control, and we’re prone to wander from the one who directs our paths and orders our steps. But God is so gracious to His children. He knows the tendencies of our hearts, where we wane in trust, and He tenderly meets us where we are. I’m grateful to the Lord for meeting me in my unbelief and impressing on my heart two basic yet profound aspects of His character that give us reason to confidently say, “not my will, but yours be done.”

God is Uniquely Holy

The Lord’s prayer in Matthew 6 begins like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come your will be done…” In order to say with joyful abandon, “your will be done,” we first need to begin to grasp that our Father is hallowed. He is holy beyond our ability to fully comprehend. His holiness is described throughout the Scriptures, but Isaiah 6:1 is particularly striking to me: “…I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple.”

In this vision from Isaiah, there is an occupied throne, not a chair or a seat, but a throne, and our sovereign Lord, the ruler of the universe, sits on it. The throne signifies God’s authority, His sovereignty, His justice, and His grace. And the throne is not in the midst of a crowd, but it’s high and lifted up. It’s majestic; it’s seen above all else.

The train the Lord is wearing fills the temple. The most tangible picture we have to compare is from royal weddings where the bride’s train fills the aisle in width and at a length that is often extraordinary. But even this picture wanes in comparison to what Isaiah sees. His robe fills the entirety of the temple. What glory. What holiness. John Piper explains:

“He is incomparable. His holiness is his utterly unique divine essence…In the word ‘holy’ we have sailed to the world’s end in the utter silence of reverence and wonder and awe: ‘The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him (Habakkuk 2:20).’”

If this is true of the God we serve, then my ways cannot be better than His ways. They simply can’t be. He knows more, He knows better, and He knows all. And each detail of my life, even the ones I don’t want or have trouble accepting, is part of a greater purpose that brings glory to our Father’s hallowed name. We can’t fully comprehend God’s holiness, but when this part of His character begins to penetrate our hearts, we have the ability to say with greater confidence, “not my will but yours be done.”

God is Incomparably Loving

In a similar way, the love of God is difficult to fully grasp, especially for those who did not experience great love from their earthly fathers, but we have treasured glimpses of it. The descriptions of God’s love for His children show that he loves without limits (Ephesians 3:17,18), He loves sacrificially (1 John 3:16), without wavering (Psalm 118), and God loves in a way that is incomparable to anyone or anything in this life (1 John 4:9). No one can love us in the way that Jesus does.

I sat at a girls’ soccer game last fall and watched as a little boy ran around on the sidelines, circling his dad’s chair, kicking a small ball, and cheering on his sister with oblivion as to what was going on in the game. I knew the family and knew the boy had been adopted as an infant, so when he jumped into his dad’s lap and they began laughing and hugging, I had to hold back tears. Such uncommon beauty in an ordinary moment. This precious boy will always know a father’s love because his mom and dad took him home as their own, not because of anything the child did, but because they decided to give him their hearts.

I can’t help but think of this scene when reflecting on God’s boundless love. It’s poured out not because of anything I have done, nor anything I could ever do, but because He has set his love on His beloved sons and daughters. And nothing can cause that love to diminish or fade. Life’s most fearful moments and grief filled seasons are filled to overflowing with this incomparable love. We feel it with a hug from a friend and we see it on the comforting pages of Scripture. He is closer than our breath when we’re in valley, and He is pouring out his love with each and every step.  

In the chaos and uncertainty of this life, there is a God ruling on His throne, and He is a good and loving Father. It’s into His hands we relinquish our own desires and wants so that we can freely and confidently say, Father, not my will, but yours be done.