Jesus, Take the Wheel

I've been listening to this song in my head for two days now. Well, this and "Christmas Lullaby" from "Songs for a New World." (Normally I would italicize the title of the musical, rather than putting it in quotes like it was another song, but I'm using a Mac, and Safari, so I don't have all those cool formatting options.)

"Jesus take the wheel;
take it from my hands,
'cause I can't do this on my own...
I'm letting go,
so give me one more chance--
save me from this road I'm on..."

For all my talk about conversion this summer, and despite my need to do so, I'm still not ready to give up my problems to Jesus. For me, that doesn't mean not doing anything about them, but rather acknowledging that I need to do more than admit my faults: I need to change. In a variety of different situations, the way that I handle things is the same way I've been handling them, bungling them beyond belief. And like the man who was drowning in a river I've seen the life saver, the boat and the Coast Guard, but waved them on, waiting for things just to change. To return to the song's driving metaphor, for some reason I think that I can keep steering the way I have been, and praying harder, and somehow the road will change beneath me--this time I won't spin out, all the while knowing I will.

I know, convoluted beyond belief without details, but you're not getting any of those. Therapeutic this may be, but therapy it most certainly isn't. Suffice it to say that, for all my bravado, I am petrified of change. Not of physical change, but of the kind that might actually count. It's like "What About Bob?": if I continue messing certain things up, my faults are quantifiable. If I change them, get rid of them, then I have to face new challenges that, cerebrally, I know I'll be able to handle but that I'm too lazy to want to face. I'm almost comforted by the surety of failure.

I guess it actually comes back to my last entry...Oscillation, while weird, and while mentally abhorant, is comfortable. It's the same rocking motion that parents use to put their children to sleep. Why else am I back at ND at all? Yes, I love the program, and yes, I have no regrets. But at the same time, I was so set on coming back here, to somewhere I was comfortable and peaceful that, having been accepted elsewhere, I said no. It's why I am drawn to people who will like me but cannot love me, why I content myself with skills I know I have rather than trying new things, why I spent part of this summer working at the same job I started 6 years ago. All are without risk of changing the person I believe myself to be. I have made peace with this person.

But if that were true, I wouldn't feel this way. It's just another comfortable lie that puts me in control. I'm determined to wring this wheel to death before I let Someone else steer. But I have hope, and Vision gave it to me. It was the first thing I've done in a long time that has stretched the limits of the person I think I am. And I kind of like what I see at the edges. Which brings us to the other song:

"In the eyes of heaven, my place is assured;
I carry with me heaven's grand design...
Gloria, gloria, I will sing the name of the Lord,
and He will make me shine."

I'm starting to believe it. Brace for the changes... I promise they will be for the better.