Submissive or Stubborn?

I am very much like my grandmother. My mother and I lived with my grandparents during the years she was separated from my father and then later divorced. My grandmother had a lot of influence on me and I realized after I was grown that I was more like her than I was my mother.
That was good in a lot of respects. She was the kind of person who would not let circumstances hold her back. She was determined and focused in the middle of difficult times. However that determination was also stubbornness at times.

I had a very close friend who was a member of our church when we lived in Georgia. She was old enough to be my mother and we had developed a very close friendship. One day she told me I was like a dog with a bone - she said "you just won't give it up". She knew I was the kind of person who would hang on and push forward in difficult times. We both loved the Lord and she would use this expression as I would continue to pray for her alcoholic husband and beg the Lord for him to be relieved of this bondage.

This is true about me but there is another truth that is not pretty and that is where my determination becomes stubbornness before the Lord.

This morning I was reading Psalm 32 and focusing on verse 8 and 9. "I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will guide you with My eye. Do not be like the horse or like the mule, which have no understanding, which must be harnessed with bit and bridle, else they will not come near you."

I am like my grandmother in terms of stubbornness and that is not good. I see my stubbornness as I read the words of this psalm. The Lord wants to surround me with mercy and take care of me but my stubbornness gets in the way many times. Now I know God is sovereign and does whatever He pleases but He also allows us to walk in our stubbornness many times to show us more of who He is. Often I know the Lord is leading me or correcting and guiding me but if it is a direction I don't want to go I will fight it. I am like the horse or mule who has to be harnessed so it can be brought into submission. Because of the Lord's sovereignty, I will be brought into submission but here is the thing. I can come submissively and enjoy the fellowship and mercy He surrounds me with or I can come kicking and screaming pulling against Him. Either way, His way will be done. It is like a child and we have all been there. You are taking them to the doctor because they are sick and they are kicking and screaming and you are almost dragging them. You are doing it for their good but they don't want to go and get that shot or have their ear poked. It is the same with us. We are just a little more refined about it. What the Lord plans for us is for our good and His glory but we don't want to go there. We have other plans. James 4:17 says, "Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin." Read the passage to get the context but I believe it is applicable.

If you are in the middle of decisions and know that you are wanting your way instead of doing what you know God would have you to do, repent. David in psalm 32 kept silent about his sin and he describes a miserable picture. Then he confesses his sin and receives the Lord's forgiveness. David is the one who says "he who trusts in the Lord, mercy shall surround him."

By the way, my grandmother did not know the Lord until shortly before her death when she was 91 years old. My friend in Georgia has since gone to be with the Lord. I praise the Lord for both of them.