Learning to Receive Instead of Control
Much of modern life is built around control. We plan, manage, optimize, and protect. We measure success by how little surprises us and how rarely we must depend on anyone.
And then the Gospel speaks a different language.
Christian faith is not primarily the art of controlling outcomes. It is the art of receiving a gift — and allowing that gift to transform us.
To receive is difficult because receiving requires humility. It requires admitting need. It requires surrendering the illusion that we can save ourselves. It requires trust — and trust is costly.
Many of us would rather “do for God” than “receive from God.” Doing feels strong. Receiving feels vulnerable. Doing can be measured. Receiving cannot.
Yet the whole Christian life begins with reception. We do not create grace. We do not earn adoption. We do not produce resurrection. We receive them.
In a Franciscan spirit, this truth becomes sharper. Poverty of spirit is not mainly about lacking things; it is about belonging to God rather than to our own strategies. It is the choice to live with open hands — hands that can be filled because they are not clenched.
Control often masquerades as responsibility. But there is a difference between faithful effort and anxious grasping. Faithful effort works hard and leaves outcomes to God. Anxious grasping works hard and demands guarantees.
The Lord invites us out of that demanding posture.
Receiving begins in prayer. Prayer is not a lever we pull to make God act. Prayer is communion — remaining with God, listening, consenting, trusting. Often we receive nothing we can measure in the moment, and that is the point: God is forming us to love Him for His own sake.
Receiving also begins in the sacraments.
In the Eucharist, we do not seize Christ; we receive Christ. We do not control Him; we consent to be fed by Him. The Eucharist teaches us that divine life is gift — and that true strength is found in dependence on God.
Even the Cross reveals this pattern. Christ receives the Father’s will. Not as resignation, but as love. Not as defeat, but as obedience that becomes victory.
We learn to receive in small ways: accepting correction, accepting limitations, accepting that some prayers remain unanswered for a time, accepting that suffering may not be removed but can be redeemed.
This is not passivity. It is surrender.
And surrender is not weakness. It is the doorway to freedom.
A person addicted to control is never at rest. Even good things become burdens because they must be managed and protected. But a person who learns to receive can be grateful. Gratitude is the fruit of receiving. Control cannot produce gratitude; it produces tension.
The Lord desires more for you than a life of tension. He desires communion — a life lived from gift.
If you are weary from controlling everything, begin with one honest prayer: “Lord, I receive what You give. Teach me to trust You.” Then practice receiving in one concrete way today: accept help, accept silence, accept a delay, accept a limitation without complaint.
The Christian life is not built on perfect plans. It is built on a faithful heart.
And faith is ultimately the courage to receive.
