Why We Strive for What We Already Have

Picture a dog spinning in circles, desperately trying to catch its own tail. Round and round it goes, exhausting itself in pursuit of something it already possesses. Amusing to watch, but kind of sad when you think about it.

For five years at the beginning of my Christian walk, I was that dog.

Every morning, I'd wake up at 4 or 5 a.m., before the kids were up. I'd spend four to five hours in my prayer room—reading the Word, studying, worshiping, praying, crying. My heart was sincere. I was desperate. I wanted so badly to learn how to hear the voice of the Lord, how to enter into His presence, how to worship "correctly," how to do all of it right.

I was faithful. I was committed. I was exhausted.

And I was chasing my tail.

The Striving Trap

When I first got saved in 2000, I felt the love of the Lord in a way that was real and undeniable. I was sold out, hooked—this was better than any drug or alcohol I'd ever had. Finally, I'd found what I'd been searching for my whole life.

But that brokenness from my dysfunctional childhood was still in me. And after a while, something shifted.

I started letting that rosy glow of connection with Him be slowly transferred from an inward intimacy to outward activity. I went to Bible college. I was in every class you could imagine. I read the Bible from front to back. I was learning, growing, doing.

And somewhere in all that doing, I started looking outside myself for significance again—the same pattern I'd followed my whole life, just with a Christian veneer.

When you're good at school, that becomes your identity. When you're good at athletics or drama or art, you attach your worth to that. For me, it became about knowing all about God, serving at church, tithing, giving—all the right Christian activities.

My magnificent obsession became knowing about Him rather than knowing Him.

I got my fill of Jesus by doing stuff FOR Him, not WITH Him.

The Difference Between "For" and "With"

Let me give you an example from my marriage. I could do Gregory's laundry, cook his meals, keep the house clean—all acts of service, all expressions of love in their own way. Gregory's love language is actually gifts of service, so these things matter to him.

But if all I do is serve him, and the minute he gets home from work I'm out the door—"I left your dinner in the microwave, bye!"—is there intimacy?

No.

Serving someone and being intimate with someone are not the same thing. Intimacy requires presence. It requires spending time together, talking, listening, learning each other, growing in depth of knowledge and connection.

It's the same with the Lord.

You can serve God faithfully and still be disconnected from Him. You can know everything about Him and still not truly know Him. You can spend hours in your prayer room and miss the whole point.

I was doing everything right by religious standards, but that struggle for intimacy was in me like a cancer. It followed me right into my walk with the Lord.

Religion's Lie

Here's what I learned in Bible college and in most church environments: Grace has to be balanced with law.

Let me be clear: That's a lie from the pit of hell.

I know that sounds harsh, but it's true. It's like putting cyanide in your coffee. "The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (2 Corinthians 3:6, NKJV). "The strength of sin is the law" (1 Corinthians 15:56, NKJV).

Before the law came, sin was never counted against people. Before Moses, the sins of previous generations were not held against them because they broke no commandment until there was a commandment to break (Romans 5:13-14).

Once the commandments came, suddenly there was a focus on sin. And yes, the law was good—it was a tutor to show us what was wrong. "Don't kill, don't steal, don't commit adultery." These are helpful boundaries.

But when you have Christ in you, you don't want to do those things anyway. The law is written on your heart. I don't need a law to tell me not to cheat on Gregory—I adore Gregory! He makes me happy. I would never want to hurt him.

But that brokenness was still in me, making it easy for me to catch the hook that I needed to get my identity outside of my relationship with God. I needed to earn it, work for it, prove myself worthy of it.

So knowing Him—knowing all about Him—became my magnificent obsession. And for a long time, it was like a placebo. I almost got my fill of Jesus by doing stuff for Him.

But it wasn't real connection. It was religious activity.

The Breakthrough: Just Relax

After five years of this exhausting cycle, something shifted.

I learned that all I had to do was relax.

The dog already has the tail. It just needs to stop running.

He was already in me, living in me, closer than my skin. All I had to do was rest. The grape attached to the vine doesn't have to struggle to produce fruit—it just has to yield.

I needed to start trusting more in His ability to communicate than in my ability to hear.

And when I did that, everything changed.

It became okay if He talked to me through a sunset. Or through a word someone spoke. Or through a Bible verse I'd read a hundred times before. Or through a friend's encouragement. Now I can see Him in everything, because "in Him we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28, NKJV).

I don't disconnect anymore. It's not like I have my prayer time and then I have the rest of my life. There's no separation between the sacred and the secular.

My work is worship. Doing the dishes is worship—He's doing them with me. Driving to appointments is worship. Conversations with clients are opportunities to see Him move. It just makes life a whole lot easier and a whole lot more productive.

From Striving to Yielding

Jesus said, "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing" (John 15:5, NKJV).

Notice it's a two-way connection: "He who abides in Me, and I in him." Both ways. Not just me reaching up to Him, but Him dwelling in me.

And how does the branch produce fruit? By resting.

Does the grape go, "I have to be a grape. Oh, I've got to be a good grape. I've got to work really hard to be a grape"?

Welcome to religion. Welcome to most of our human experience, actually. I don't like to blame just religion—it's how we were raised. Our families brought us up believing we have to strive to be more, that we're not good enough the way we are.

And so we create a world where we begin to strive to become something we already are.

The dog chasing its tail.

Our life flows from Him. He is the vine, and we are the branches. The fruit bears naturally when we rest in who we are in Him.

What Are You Chasing?

So let me ask you: What are you reaching for outside yourself?

Is it the next promotion? The next achievement? The approval of others? The "right" amount of Bible knowledge? The perfect quiet time? The feeling that you've finally done enough to be acceptable to God?

Here's the truth: You don't have to reach outside yourself to gain the thing you really need. You already have it.

"Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10, NKJV). I love the Amplified Bible's version of this verse: "Let be and be still, and know (recognize and understand) that I am God."

Relax. Let go. Stop striving.

And that's actually worship. Because it's trust. Trust that He is enough. Trust that you are enough in Him. Trust that the tree of life really is sufficient—you don't have to go to the tree of knowledge of good and evil to become something you already are.

An Invitation to Rest

If you're exhausted from all your striving, I have good news: You can stop.

You can stop spinning in circles trying to catch what you already possess.

You can stop reaching outside yourself for significance.

You can stop working so hard to hear a voice that's already speaking.

He's not distant. He's not withholding. He's not waiting for you to get it right before He'll show up.

He's already there. In you. With you. Closer than your skin.

All you have to do is relax and notice.

See Him in the sunset. Hear Him in the word of a friend. Feel His presence in the ordinary moments of your day. Let your work become worship. Let washing dishes become communion. Let driving become prayer.

This is intimacy. This is life. This is what you were created for.

Not striving. Not performing. Not earning.

Just being. Just resting. Just abiding.

The dog already has the tail. You already have everything you need.

Now just stop running and enjoy it.

What are you striving for that you might already possess in Christ? What would it look like to stop chasing and start resting? Share your thoughts in the comments—I'd love to hear your story.

Blessings,
Susan 😊