The Mirage We Chase
Control ranks among the most seductive illusions of modern existence. We plan with precision, forecast results, and safeguard priorities. Systems emerge—apps, calendars, budgets, fitness trackers—objectives crystallize, and outcomes fall under scrutiny. Health, finances, and relationships undergo constant monitoring, all sustained by the conviction that relentless effort can mold reality to our design. We rise early, stay late, and measure progress in metrics. Yet this drive extends beyond pragmatism; it unveils a theology where human autonomy eclipses divine rule, where “I” becomes the center of the universe.
Beneath the surface, however, lurks profound unease. Anxiety, exhaustion, and dread mark the harvest of lives devoted to mastery. Sleep evades. Joy fades. Relationships strain under the weight of expectation. Scripture names this “anxious toil” as futile when it ignores God’s provision: “It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep” (Ps. 127:2 ESV). The psalmist does not condemn diligence; he condemns diligence divorced from dependence.
Believers often voice trust in God while living as if success depends solely on personal exertion. We affirm providence in prayer meetings, then panic when plans falter. Theologians label this functional atheism—conduct that treats God as absent or impotent in the ordinary. Prayers invoke divine will, yet disruption triggers alarm. Hymns proclaim soul-deep peace, but tranquility evaporates without performance. We sing “It is well with my soul,” but our hearts whisper, Only if everything goes according to plan.
This chapter unmasks control as illusion: its forms, its appeal, and Scripture’s verdict that it functions as counterfeit deity. The Edenic serpent offered not disorder but dominion: “You will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:5 ESV). Control thus emerges as rival creed, preaching self-determination and cloaking defiance in duty, arrogance in foresight. The slogan “You are in control” stands condemned as idolatry—a throne built for the creature, not the Creator.
Scripture counters with radical summons: “Be still, and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10 ESV). Stillness here denotes surrender, the stance of a heart acknowledging authentic authority. It is not inactivity but active trust. Jesus echoes this in the Sermon on the Mount: “Do not be anxious about your life. . . . Look at the birds of the air. . . . Your heavenly Father feeds them” (Matt. 6:25–26 ESV). He does not minimize need; He magnifies the Provider.
Such surrender initiates sovereign rest—relinquishment rather than retreat, peace rather than paralysis, worship rather than weakness. It voices confident release: Outcomes elude my command, yet I trust the Ordainer. The future remains veiled, yet I know its Keeper. I am not God—and that truth liberates.
Amid cultural obsession with mastery, sovereign rest invites reclamation of peace rooted in the One who upholds creation: “He is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Col. 1:17 ESV). The atoms do not scatter. The planets do not collide. And your life—your fragile, beautiful life—rests in the same hands.
The Cultural Creed: “You Are in Control”
From childhood, society instills the imperative to seize command. “Become anything you desire.” “Forge your destiny.” “Resist external definition.” These maxims transcend encouragement; they herald autonomy as gospel, rendering control not instrument but essence. Achievement demands dominance; maturity, independence; insight, self-reliance. The child who colors outside the lines is corrected; the teen who questions authority is labeled rebellious. By adulthood, the message is clear: Your life is your project. Build it well.
This narrative saturates Western existence—labor, intimacy, child-rearing, even devotion—exalting self-mastery while scorning reliance. Success is measured in output, influence, and image. Failure is personal defect. Vulnerability is weakness. Scripture, however, dismantles the idol and beckons toward divine governance.
Genesis opens with God’s fiat, not human initiative. “Let there be light” (Gen. 1:3 ESV)—and there was. Creation bows to His voice; humanity, imaged after Him, receives mandate to tend under His reign, not to rule in His place. The fall in Genesis 3 constitutes not mere infraction but usurpation. The serpent tempts Eve with sovereignty: “You will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:5 ESV). This primal lure—to arbitrate morality autonomously—fuels contemporary overplanning, perfectionism, worry, coercion, and dread of uncertainty.
Yet Scripture persistently redirects from self-dependence to yielded confidence. The psalmist commands: “Be still, and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10 ESV)—not indolence but repose in the true Ruler. Jesus reinforces: “Do not be anxious about your life. . . . Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matt. 6:25–26 ESV). He shatters the fiction that serenity derives from strategy, urging reliance on paternal provision.
Where culture equates dominance with vigor, Scripture recasts surrender as maturity’s pinnacle. Paul affirms divine oversight as intimate redemption: “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom. 8:28 ESV). The promise is not ease but orchestration—every thread, even the dark ones, woven into Christlikeness.
Living beneath God’s throne does not diminish liberty; it unveils it. Lay aside self-sovereignty’s burden for providence’s gentle yoke. Reject control’s emptiness; embrace trust in the One sustaining all with flawless wisdom and affection. The cultural creed crumbles under the weight of its own impossibility. The gospel offers a better story.
Genesis 3: The First Grasp for Control
The allure of control traces to Eden’s dawn. The serpent extends not anarchy but ascendancy: “You will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:5 ESV). The phrase transcends cognition; it promises prerogative to decree morality apart from revelation—autonomy to script existence. Eve saw the fruit was “desirable for gaining wisdom” (Gen. 3:6 ESV). She reached. Adam followed. The grasp was made.
Their choice exceeds disobedience; it seizes Creator prerogative, trading stewardship for self-crown. Cornelius Plantinga Jr. describes sin as “culpable disturbance of shalom,” rupturing divine-human harmony (Plantinga 1995, 16). Humanity proclaims, “We shall govern.” The image-bearers become idol-makers.
Consequences cascade: shame covers nakedness (Gen. 3:7), concealment hides from God (Gen. 3:8), accusation shifts blame (Gen. 3:12), cursed soil resists labor (Gen. 3:17–19). Promised freedom yields servitude; mastery births disorder under holy judgment. The garden becomes a graveyard of dreams.
Humanity replays this error endlessly—schedule tyranny, relational puppeteering, flawlessness pursuit, circumstance coercion—each rooted in refusal of creaturely posture beneath wise, loving authority. The executive who micromanages, the parent who scripts a child’s future, the spouse who manipulates emotions—all echo Eden’s reach.
Control, far from psychological reflex, proves theological revolt: defiance masked as duty, hubris as caution. It enthrones finite ego where infinite God belongs, echoing the serpent across eras. Augustine laments, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you” (Augustine 1991, 3). Restlessness endures while control persists.
Grace, however, dawns amid curse. Genesis 3:15 forecasts a Seed crushing the deceiver. In Christ, the Second Adam, sovereignty reclaims through redemption, inviting return—not to grasp but to release, not to define but to receive goodness from the Good. Eden’s blight yields to Calvary’s cure, clutching to repose, revolt to restoration.
Consider Abraham. Promised a nation, he waited decades. In impatience, he grasped—Hagar, Ishmael, a plan B (Gen. 16). Chaos followed. Yet God redeemed the mess, fulfilling His word through Isaac. Abraham learned: God’s timing, not man’s scheming. Discern the serpent’s murmur within. Label control theological treason. Heed the Father’s summons: Return. Release. Repose in the eternal Sovereign whose reign proves perpetually wise, kind, and redemptive.