How to Make Peace with What You Can’t Control (Part 2 of 2)

Focus on the Family with Jim Daly

In this second part of a two-part episode, Lysa TerKeurst continues her discussion on overcoming the fear-driven need for control, emphasizi

Key takeaways

• Fear of rejection, abandonment, or loss often drives the need for control in relationships.
• Trying to prevent all harm (like cancer) is impossible; focusing on responsible care rather than perfection is healthier.

Main topics

• Fear as a root cause of control
• Healing emotional wounds from childhood

Notable quotes

"We are releasing them into the arms of God, and that's the safest place for any person to be."

Conclusion

True peace comes when we release our need for control and trust God with

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:01) Pastors, if you're struggling to help couples in your church whose marriage is in trouble, we can help. Marriage 911 by Focus on the Family trains lay people to mentor married couples. Each kit includes two training guides, four workbooks, and all the training necessary to meet with couples who need help. Go to marriage911.com. That's marriage, the numbers 911.com. Speaker 1 (0:31) When we release a loved one, when we release a child into trusting the Lord, you know, we're releasing them to the Lord. We're not releasing them to a cliff to fall over. We need to mentally have this picture. We are releasing them into the arms of God, and that's the safest place for any person to be. Now, will we always get the outcome that we want? Absolutely not. But regardless, We can't control the outcome anyways. Speaker 3 (1:01) That's insight from Lisa Turkhurst, who's our guest today again on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. Speaker 4 (1:07) And we're glad you've joined us. I'm John Fuller. You know, John, it's great to have Lisa back. Every time it's just like wisdom, wisdom, wisdom. And she's lived, you know, a life of observation, I would say. You know, last time we talked about fear and control, and we're going to continue that discussion today. It was so... good and has application for each and every person because in this life, in our sinful nature, Fear, which the Lord does not want us to live in, leads to unhealthy control issues. And I would say, you know, many of the marital problems that we see here at Focus on the Family that we help at Hope Restored, our marriage intensive, much of it is rooted in this area of fear and control. And I'm so grateful she's written the book that we can talk about today. And I just want to get on with it. Yeah, Speaker 3 (1:52) yeah. Speaker 4 (1:52) And that Speaker 3 (1:52) book is called Making Peace with What I Can't Control. Find relief from the exhaustion of overthinking. trying to fix others, and wanting to figure it all out. Speaker 4 (2:01) Hey, hang on, John. The phones are ringing off the hook. Speaker 3 (2:05) Don't miss out on your opportunity. Contact us today if you want to get a copy of the book. And, by the way, download the broadcast app that we have so you don't have any fear about missing out on what Lisa shared last time. Speaker 4 (2:18) We covered a lot of material last time, but we're going to roll into continuing to get to this issue of fear and control and all that. Let's go back and kind of talk about the common fears that often lead to control, because we didn't get to that list. And I'll read them again, and I want you to highlight a couple. But fear of rejection, abandonment, or not being loved. So these are the things in our, a lot of times in our childhood that we experience that set up our attitudes and our emotions. emotional response. And Speaker 1 (2:48) even our perceptions of present day things we're going to face, we will pull from these previous feelings. And they may go all the way back to unhealed things in our childhood, or even experiences that we had throughout our adulthood. But Boy, rejection's a big one. Speaker 4 (3:03) And abandonment. I mean, in a marriage, that can be the other spouse is working late, and you catastrophize that into, what are they doing? They're not wanting to spend time with me. And they're actually working on a project that the boss said, could you get this done by the time you leave tonight? So some of that is like that, right? And because of those wounds as a child, you're... making it is something it's not. Speaker 1 (3:26) Yeah, I think one of the greatest fears that we have as humans is emotional suffering. And certainly, the fear of loss ties right into that as well. I tell a story in the book about one of my dearest friends, her name is Leah. She has worked side by side with me on every book project that I've done for it seems like eons, truly. But because we're so close and we're working together all the time, we process a lot of life. I tell a story about Leah losing her father to brain cancer. And he went from being this vibrant, healthy, strong man to finding out he had a brain tumor. And then the decline and deterioration, it was shocking. It definitely impacted her. And the grief was enormous. So Leah had one son by the time her father passed, and then she since had another daughter. And she came to me and she said, I think there's this area of controlling that has been really troublesome to my marriage. And that is that I always want to make every choice for my kids to make sure that they are healthy. And, you know, I've watched my father deteriorate, and I don't want that in my children. And so it's caused some tension. between her and her husband. So we were processing this. And I asked her a very important question. I said, Leah, are you trying to keep your kids healthy? Or are you trying to prevent cancer? Because trying to keep your kids healthy, that is a responsible thing to do. Trying to prevent cancer is impossible. You can do all that you can do to set your children's health up for success, but ultimately you cannot control whether or not they ever get, you know, a diagnosis of cancer. And I think that helped open her brain to that fine line between being responsible, feed your kids healthy food, do what you need to do to keep them healthy, but not be so controlling where you take it into hyperdrive trying to prevent cancer because at the end of the day, that's not going to be possible. Speaker 4 (5:36) Yeah, and that's a good example of how to deal in a healthy way with something that could be unhealthy. I mean, what was her first response, if you can recall? I mean, was she defensive? No, Speaker 1 (5:48) she wasn't because I asked her a very important question at first. Are you open to a thought? And anytime we're going to share something that could step on somebody's toes, you just ask, you know, are you open to a thought? And she said, yes, I am. And so I asked her that profound question. You know, are you trying to keep your kids healthy? Are you trying to prevent cancer? And it really, really impacted. on a very practical level the way that she's now interacting with her family. It was life-changing to her. It's not a perfect science, of course, does she sometimes still step into trying to perfect cancer? Of course she does. But because she's aware of it, it has drastically improved the environment of her home. And I think that's the secret. It's not to do this right all the time, but it's to get it right while there is still time to... provide a healthier environment for us and our loved ones. Speaker 4 (6:42) Yeah, that is so good. In that regard, you were up in an alpine, I think, one of those alpine slide rides. We have plenty of them here in Colorado, actually. Come visit them. But it's what they do in the summertime, and you get into this metal, I don't know what you'd call it. car. Yeah, kind of a roller coaster car. Yeah, and you ride down the ski slopes, and you do it at a fast pace. But you learned something in that, kind of that