I woke up in the middle of the night because of mosquitoes. Those little bloodsuckers that won’t leave you alone. One there, one here. One is landing on my face, one on my arm and I’m hitting myself black and blue, but they just keep buzzing and flying around looking for a new spot to land.
It’s so annoying. They don’t just get on your skin, but under it as well! It’s in the middle of the night and I’m too sleepy to go for a mosquito hunt. I realize I let them steal my rest. Why? I thought let’s just pray about it: Lord protect me from these little buggers, that they leave my body alone, in Jesus’ name. Done. Now I let it go. I put it in Gods hands. And so I went back to sleep.
In the morning I realized something.
It was not about the mosquitoes letting me be, but that I let the mosquitoes be
And that happened after prayer, giving the mosquito-problem out of my own hands in God’s. Then I could leave them be. I did not try to slap them anymore, I stopped struggling with those pesky invaders, and I let them be and was able to fall asleep softly.
It’s a simple example. Mosquitoes are like problems. They can bite you, bug you and steal your rest. Like a mosquito sucks blood, problems can also drain your energy. Maybe you are hitting yourself black and blue over an issue that you’re struggling to deal with. We sometimes are hurting ourselves or others in our eagerness to see a problem solved.
If you let go of problems then it doesn’t mean they will no longer be there buzzing around your head or try and bite you. They will still be there, but you let them be. You can relax, even though you’re surrounded by them. Just like Jesus sleeping in a boat in the middle of a storm. Because you trust that God will go on the ‘mosquito hunt’ for you! He will take hold of your problem until there is a solution found. You trust that He will stand up for you and provide.
I’m not saying it’s bad to have problems, or to look for solutions. But sometimes we have too much on our plate, or we’re wrestling with the kind of issues that we can better keep our hands off.
Master of wrestling
I’m a master of wrestling with problems that are better to let go of. I have often put up an exhausting fight with the kind of mosquitoes that bite from the inside or outside, when God said: “this is not your fight – I will fight for you”.
I am often still wrestling with myself. But I learn to let go more. Of issues. That helps me to relax again. And strangely, when I relax problems get resolved also. Like knots in a rope that can only get loosened when the tension on the rope is released.
Your problem also needs space to breathe. It’s allowed to be. It needs air. And to be put in the light.
You’re allowed to be a human having issues, that is struggling with mosquitoes in the night or whatever it is that frustrates or keeps you up at night. With your getting stuck and stuck in the getting, your wrong turns and dead ends, fallbacks and setbacks, falling down and going under.
You may just be yourself with God, with problems small and big.
