Garden Etiquette and My Cup of Tea

“I am learning that praying for God’s will is harder than it seems. When God’s will is asked for in hopes of it agreeing with a personal desire, it is not asking for God’s will at all. It takes complete surrender and self sacrifice.”~ by Jayson VS ~ Loni’s son

I think the best example of praying for God’s will was Jesus in the garden. He couldn’t have given us better words to say, “Not my will but yours be done.” Long before saying that Jesus already made it clear that He would like to have a different cup than the one He was handed.

Boy if that isn’t the truth. There are many times in life we clearly don’t like the cup we are handed but the question we ask and the outcome should never differ. “Thy Will not my will be done.” Just yesterday I was handed a new cup to drink from. Unfortunately I wasn’t invited to pick out my own china. I didn’t get to line up all the options and compare what I saw with other dishes on the shelf or the color scheme of my kitchen.


No, from the mouth of a total stranger who was the emergency room doctor on duty that night delivered the message. As I laid on the gurney in pain from midnight to 8 in the morning at last he entered my room for the last time to give me the verdict. “You have bone cancer, Karen.” He said.




If it had been my will I would have taken his little cup of tea and threw it against the ER wall smashing it to pieces while telling him, “No thanks. I don’t want any.” Unfortunately I wasn’t given that option, after all, I already got in trouble from the ER nurse for my ER etiquette. Apparently the emergency room was full of people and she didn’t like the fact that I was crying out in pain as my left rib cage felt like it was going to explode. “You need to be quiet. The ER is full,” she said to me.




Did Jesus violate the garden etiquette when He cried out for God to take this cup from Him? No, for a moment there He was being human like the rest of us. He had His chance at being human and now we get our chance to be like Him and finish what Jesus did when He said in total surrender, “not my will but thy will be done.”




Easy? Oh wouldn’t we like to carry with us the all famous easy button that Staples put on the map and push it whenever needed. No what we need is totally surrendering to what God wants for us in life. Several months ago I made a white flag for me and one of my granddaughters that says, “Yes Lord” on it. I tried to explain to her what the white flag represents, total surrender but I’m not sure her nine year old mind grasped the concept.




Well what about my fifty two year old mind? Karen, do you grasp the concept? Now was the time to find out as I temporarily forgot the flag was even there. Putting my writing for IOW momentarily on hold I stepped away from my computer. As I walked over to my Bible I grabbed it by the dowel it was on. With no breeze going through my house at four in the morning I had to set it in motion myself. So as I firmly held on to it I waved it not in front of Jesus’ face but in my own face to remember what it is I have to do. Surrender.




It’s not asking Jesus to surrender to my wishes but me surrendering to His. It will be a long journey but as long as the outcome is the same, eternity with Jesus that’s okay. We should never require it to be an “easy” task just one that gets us where we need to be with Jesus.

Some of the best china sets I’ve ever seen over the years were ones that didn’t match but they fit well together. That’s me and Jesus and what life has handed me to stroll through on my way to Heaven. It may not be “my cup of tea” but it’s the cup I’ve been handed and Praise the Lord I have God. A God who will help me hold it up with my pinky finger extended out taking small quiet sips in proper “garden etiquette” of total surrender. Total peace.

© 2010 Karen J Gillett @ Pencil Marks and Recipes Publishing