Life With You | Blog + Lyric Video
- Natalia Chase
- Mar 26
- 5 min read
Updated: Mar 30
In 2012, my family and I were caught in a relentless whirlwind of youth sports, music recitals and demanding careers that required a lot of travel. While all of these things were good, the snowball effect of “too much of a good thing” began taking its toll. We were losing sight of what really mattered. After a few visits to the principal’s office for one problem or another and a slew of illnesses that went from one child to the next, we finally saw the writing on the wall: this was not the life we had set out to live. You see, when my husband and I were married in the early 2000s, we established a few rules to live by and our existing lifestyle was showing strong opposition to each of them.
Over time, life can cause you to slowly drift away from your values if you allow it to sit in the driver’s seat. Life will always take the helm by default if you give up the wheel. In this sense, “life” has many different names - a vocation, a relationship, a hobby, an addiction – anything that you have given authority to drive the turns of your life. While there are factors in life we cannot control, I would argue that we generally have the ability to choose who sits in our driver’s seat, be that God or something else.
My driver's seat was given up to what I felt was a good cause – positioning my family better financially. My goals were never to get a bigger home or a nicer car; in fact, in order to be more frugal, I chose to do things like downgrade my car. But this “good cause” had inadvertently become my life’s highest priority and was quite different than our “God first, marriage second, kids third” family motto—those values we aspired to live by. I had put God in the backseat and my kids were in the trunk with my husband. The evidence was all around: chaperoning school field trips became a daunting task and dates with my husband went from three hours per week to 30-minute lunch catch-ups that were often cancelled due to rescheduled work meetings. And the list goes on...
We have a responsibility to do the best with the short time on this Earth that we have been given, and there are a lot of choices we can make with the hand dealt to us. With that in mind, my husband and I decided to intentionally choose who we wanted in our driver's seat. We gave back to God full autonomy to drive our lives. He was calling us to make time for studying the Bible with friends who would challenge us to another level of service and spiritual maturity. We also felt strongly that he wanted us to spend more time focusing on our marriage and being “present” with our three children in ways that would get them back on track to becoming people of strong character.
We knew accomplishing these things would require major change: one of us would need to press pause on our full-time career. All things considered, since it was wiser for me to do so, several months later I quit a job I truly enjoyed for something far better - the slow life. More peace, order and stability were now ours. In the process, to fuel my desire to make an impact on young people through the gift of music, I began teaching vocal lessons part-time. This proved to be more rewarding than I ever expected and helped me get more involved in my kids' school, their lives and their friends’ lives.
While the transition was not always a bed of roses and required much planning, financial sacrifice and rearranging of schedules, I found that living this impassioned God-centered life brought everything into focus and opened my eyes more clearly; life was experienced and felt more vividly. There was an amazing peace and joy that came with living intentionally instead of being carried through the whirlwind of life as if I didn’t have a say in the matter.
Looking back, I wonder why it took me so long to pull the trigger on the change I knew needed to happen. I guess the fear of uncertainty reared its ugly head. But more than anything else, I now see that my driver's seat was up for grabs and the constant competition of who or what was charting my course was taking a serious toll.
"When people’s steps follow the LORD, God is pleased with their ways. If they stumble, they will not fall, because the LORD holds their hand" (Psalm 37:23-24 NCV).
By God’s grace I was taught a great lesson. I stumbled but eventually re-hired the best driver known to man. And I am encouraged to know that if ever I get off track again, Jesus will always accept me where I am and guide me back to a place of peace and rest.
The beauty of it all is that each of us have the ability to choose who is in the driver's seat of our lives. Is your life going in a different direction than you know it should? Or perhaps you are on a well-planned path that is not bringing the fulfillment you thought it might? Maybe you’ve tried a number of paths but haven’t found your footing? If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, perhaps you too should have a soul-searching moment about the current driver of your life, and consider hiring a new one.
Sit in stillness for one minute and ask God to speak to you (even if you've never heard His voice before). Write down what comes to mind.
~~~
If you could pinpoint the major “driver” in your life, who or what comes to mind?
~~~
Tell God about your “driver;” invite him into any challenges life with this driver presents.
~~~
Jesus wants to be your driver and help you through the twists and turns of life...
If you have not already done so and want to offer your driver’s seat to Jesus, take a moment now to tell him so. (Or if you’ve already entrusted your driver’s seat to him, use this time to thank him for all the ways he’s rescued and blessed you on your life’s journey):
~~~
Let’s pray:
Lord, I confess my need for you. At times, I’ve allowed things other than you to drive my life. But now, I want to set things in their proper place and repent for allowing other things to take precedence over you. Lord, would you be the driver in every area of my life? I know you want to set me free from the chains of my past and from things - even those that seem good - that desire to control me. You never want me to be bound up and controlled by any person or thing. So now I pray for more of your Holy Spirit. Come and have your way. Be the sole driver in my life. Hold me in close relationship with you so that I can know it’s always your glory and your righteousness that fuels me. At the end of my days may I declare, as Paul did, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, and I have remained faithful. And now the prize awaits me—the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on the day of his return. And the prize is not just for me but for all who eagerly look forward to his appearing” (2 Timothy 2:4-8 NLT).
Comments