Am I a quitter?

I realized something the other day.  I am a quitter. I quit when I don’t think I will succeed.  I quit when I am frustrated. I quit when I am tired. I quit when I am insecure.

This is a newish realization.  I always said that I didn’t quit easily.  Especially with work. But now I am seeing more that I won’t quit in things that would affect others.  (People pleasing). But I quit on myself all the time.  

What have I quit you ask… Softball, art, piano, ballet, praise team, choir, drama.  And then there are the things I quit on before I even started, such as debate, show choir, dance team, volleyball, grad school.

I am a quitter.  And I didn’t really realize it. Until the other day.  What did it you ask… I was trying to take a picture of my son in a Halloween costume.  He is not even 2, so standing still is a foreign idea. Not to mention putting strange clothes on.  Did I really expect it to go smoothly?

I stood him up by the wall, and my husband went to put on a final piece of the costume.  And He lost it! So here I am attempting to snap a picture of him running and crying. So after 2 blurry pictures, I *threw* set my phone down in frustration. Which made him even more upset.  

To which my husband replied, “We can’t quit now.  We barely even tried. ”

I quit before I started.

That whole next week I felt that the Holy Spirit was allowing my heart to be sensitive to the issue.  I feared failure at work, I feared failure at home, and I feared failure at some personal “projects” (a loose term for a vague idea in my head).  And many of the thoughts I had that went something like this “Maybe I should just quit.”, “Maybe this was a terrible idea”, “Why did I even bother”, “This is never going to happen”.... 

I quit on ideas that I hadn’t even voiced out loud, mostly because I had no confidence that they could be accomplished.  I wanted an event I had been working on to be canceled because I was afraid that if it happened, no one would show up. I would rather quit than fail. 

So many instances came up in which I doubted.  I contemplated quitting. When it didn’t seem to be working perfectly or going the way I hoped, I assumed I should give up.   

In those moments, you don’t always need to quit, but you do need to surrender.  In some moments, those seem one and the same. 

But I felt a whisper that said “Surrender.”  It is not the same as quitting. Quitting is giving up.  Quitting is walking away.

But surrender… That is a giving over.  You surrender to God’s timing. You surrender to His way.  You surrender to His faithfulness and Sovereignty. To His discipline.  To His strength, generosity, discernment, and wisdom.

Surrender may mean that you will not see that desire fulfilled.  But that is not the same as quitting. It is trust in a good God that has good purposes.  A God that will do what He wants when He wants. A God that will not fail or condemn. A God that is in no rush and has nothing to prove. 

A God that will either fulfill that plan you have in His way in His time.  Or will do something different, something better.

Surrender is saying not my will but yours be done.

Surrender is knowing that your worth is not in what you produce, but in the one who conquered sin and failure on the cross for all of time. 

Surrender is saying I will stop when you say stop.  I will wait when you say wait. I will go when you say go.

In surrender, I have taken bold steps that I would never have taken on my own.  Because I was doing it God’s way, which can be big and scary and amazing.  

And in surrender, I have put a pause on things that I was really excited about, because it didn’t seem like God was empowering those desires at that moment. 

And in surrender, I have turned from desires that were out right sinful.

Because surrender is an act of worship.  A way to say I will love what you love, and hate what you hate… even when I love it.  It means I will stop when I feel like I should go. And go when it feels terrifying.

Sometimes in surrender, God will fulfill your plans the way you had hoped.  And sometimes in ways that at the time feel disappointing, even humiliating.  And sometimes in ways you wouldn’t have chosen but seem so much better.  

Surrender is more than just your plans and desires.  Surrender comes in laying down your rights, your soul, your identity.  

But like I said, quitting is giving up or walking away. Surrender is giving over.  To the One who is equally those most terrifying being in the universe and, to those who are covered by the blood of Jesus, the most loving and safe refuge.  The giver of all good things. The redeemer of the broken and failing. The conqueror of all.  

So instead of being a quitter, I want to give myself over to being a surrenderer.  To hiding safely in the arms of a Father that will give and take away with gentleness and compassion.  Who will comfort and discipline. Who will say no and say yes, for reasons that I may never understand, but can completely trust.  

He has fulfilled every promise ever recorded.  He is trustworthy and good.

In Him to quit does not feel shameful.  And a no does not feel condemning.

He will satisfy.  He will empower. He will prevail.  But He will do it in His way, in His time, and for His good purposes.

And with the people He chooses.  And we can bet that if we are His children, chosen, called, and covered in the blood of Christ, He will use us for good purposes that He predestined from the beginning.  But they are His purposes. We are His beloved and His vessels. 

He has never quit His mission.  He has from the beginning of time been redeeming the lost and calling them to himself.  He did not quit on me. And He will fulfill His purposes here on earth. But that doesn’t mean He will fulfill our purposes.  And that is why He is God, and I am not.