My Struggle with Control: What Ephesians 1 Is Teaching Me About Trust

I’ve been sitting with Ephesians 1 for the past few days, and it’s hitting me hard.

Not because it’s easy. Actually, it’s the opposite—it’s mentally draining, heavy, dense with truth I can barely wrap my head around. I’m reading it ten times over, cross-referencing commentaries, writing notes in the margins until my hand cramps. And somewhere in the middle of Paul’s run-on sentence about predestination and adoption and God’s will and redemption, I realized something:

I’ve been trying to be God.

Not in some obvious, blasphemous way. But in the quiet, anxious way where I white-knuckle every aspect of my life because I’m terrified of losing control.

This isn’t a new teaching for me. I’ve been studying Scripture daily for a while now, working through different books with handwritten notes. This idea of God’s sovereignty, His control over all things—I’ve read about it, studied it, written notes on it, sat with it, and discussed it with others.

But there’s a difference between knowing something intellectually and actually submitting to it. And that’s what’s starting to happen now with Ephesians 1. I’m just beginning to let God in on this. Just starting to try to give up my own control and submit to Him.

It’s early in this journey. But I’m already seeing results.

The Control Freak’s Confession

Let me be brutally honest with you: I am a control freak.

I always have been. For as long as I can remember, I’ve tried to control everything. And honestly? It’s netted me some success. I lost 58 pounds because I controlled every macro, every meal, every workout. I’ve excelled at work at Black Box VR because I optimize everything, chase every improvement, squeeze every ounce of productivity out of my systems.

And I know some level of control is helpful. Discipline, planning, stewardship—those are good things. God calls us to be wise stewards of what He’s given us.

But there’s a difference between healthy stewardship and what I do. What I’ve been doing isn’t wise planning—it’s anxious control. It’s not discipline—it’s an inability to trust. It’s not good stewardship—it’s white-knuckling the future out of fear.

The type of control I’m talking about—the type I struggle with—isn’t helpful. It’s destructive.

Because underneath all my optimization, underneath all my habits and systems and meticulous tracking, there’s fear.

Deep, bone-level fear.

I’m scared of the future. I’m scared of losing what I have. But more than that, I’m terrified of letting everyone down.

I’ve been anxious about these things since I was a kid.

How Fear Manifests in My Life

The fear of loss and failure shows up everywhere in my life, and it’s exhausting.

I won’t use nice things because I’m scared they’ll break or wear down. I bought this nice monitor, keyboard, and mouse for my computer setup, but for the longest time I hesitated to actually use them properly because what if something happened and I was stuck with just my laptop? Then I wouldn’t be able to get anything done because I’d gotten so used to having the nice setup.

I’ve lived in my rental home from my grandmother for almost three years now at a great rate, and I’m only just starting to settle in. I barely have any decor. Why? Because I might not have this home one day, so I better not get attached. I’m getting better about this, but it’s still a struggle. (I’m glad Maddy puts up with me, lol.)

My truck is a perfect example. I put 3,000 miles on my old truck over almost two years. THREE THOUSAND MILES. I was terrified to drive it because every short trip might ruin the diesel engine. Every weird noise sent me spiraling. I worried constantly about future maintenance costs and breakdowns. I was sacrificing today’s use—the actual purpose of owning a truck—to protect against tomorrow’s hypothetical problems.

But here’s what’s changed: I sold that truck and got another car. And you know what? I actually drive this one. I’ve been to so many places, made so many memories in it. Places I never would have gone with my old truck sitting in the driveway. I know now how much I missed out on by not using what I had.

Same with my computer setup. I finally started actually using my nice monitor, keyboard, and mouse. And my productivity at work? It’s shot through the roof. I’m getting more done, doing better work, because I’m finally using the tools I have instead of holding back out of fear.

The oddest thing? With both of these, by not trying to fully control them and just focusing on stewardship for today, I’ve actually found more peace and happiness.

These are just a few small examples of how my mind works. I do this sort of irrational thing with everything. The paradox is that I was creating guaranteed present loss to avoid possible future loss—but I never saw that through the anxiety. And when I did catch a glimpse of it, I was very good at rationalizing it away. Funny how that works, isn’t it? The mind is incredibly skilled at protecting its own dysfunction.

But the fear goes way deeper than just things.

I’m terrified I’m going to let everyone down. Not just myself—Black Box VR, Maddy, my dogs, my grandma, my mom, my dad, my family, my friends, everyone who supports and loves me.

I feel like I have big shoes to fill. My parents have both been incredibly successful, and they’ve shown me what it means to be successful while still loving your children, your family, your friends, your spouse. They’ve modeled what it looks like to bring a great life to others, to achieve things professionally without sacrificing what matters most relationally. My deepest fear isn’t just failing myself—it’s not being the person I want to be for everyone else. It’s letting them all down.

The thing is, I feel inadequate despite good results. Despite repeated praise at work, in my relationships, in most parts of my life. I do things well—not perfectly, I still make plenty of mistakes—but I’m blind to the good things I do because I’m hyper-focused on what I’m not doing or where I’m falling short.

Like with Maddy—here the problem is actually the opposite. I’ll do so many nice things for her, and I get so focused on all that good stuff that I become blind to the ways I actually hurt her. I convince myself I’m being a great boyfriend because look at all these nice things I do, and meanwhile I’m missing the small daily ways I’m letting her down or causing her pain. That same blinding effect works in reverse too.

At work, I consistently outperform. But instead of that giving me confidence, the fear of inadequacy actually hurts my productivity. If I could just do the work today without worrying about tomorrow, without that constant voice saying “it’s not enough,” I’d probably get twice as much done. The anxiety itself is the bottleneck.

The Systems I Built to Stay in Control

Because I don’t trust myself, I’ve built elaborate external systems to try to control everything.

I’ve tried literally everything. Paper planners. Digital to-do lists. Habit trackers. Custom software I built myself. Paid productivity apps. The Panda Planner. The Full Focus Planner. GTD (Getting Things Done). Eat the Frog. Every productivity system in every book I could find. You name it, I’ve probably tried it.

And you know what? The friction from all these systems actually hurt my ability to do the good things I was trying to optimize in the first place—my Bible study, my work, my relationships, my health.

It became too much work just to track that I was doing the work. The systems became more important than the actual tasks. I was spending more energy managing my productivity than being productive. I’d literally spend entire days at work optimizing my todo list, and by the end of the day, I’d have the same amount of stuff on it. I just moved tasks around for eight hours instead of actually doing them.

I used to obsess over habit tracking even for things I love—like my daily Bible study and my work at Black Box VR. I was terrified that future me would forget to do them without external accountability. I couldn’t trust myself to keep seeking God or pursuing my purpose through my work without a checkbox to prove I did it.

How ridiculous is that?

I’m literally afraid I’ll stop pursuing the most important things in my life—my relationship with God, my purpose through my work—without external pressure to keep me accountable.

And so instead of actually doing these things that really feed me and are the most important to me, I was constantly setting up the system to do them. I’d spend hours perfecting the tracking mechanism and minutes actually doing the thing I was trying to track.

I’m getting better about this now. I’ve purposely stopped tracking some habits and started trusting the Lord instead. Mostly I just use timers now—simple tools that help me focus without all the overhead of complex systems.

But it’s still a daily fight. The control freak in me is always there, always wanting to take back the reins.

That’s when I realized: my need for control isn’t really about not trusting God. It’s about my own selfishness. I don’t want to give up control.

Deep down, I know God can handle all of this. I know He’s got the plan even when I can’t see it. I know He’s working all things for good.

But I like being in control. I like the illusion that I’m managing everything. I like feeling like I’m the one holding it all together.

That’s pride. That’s selfishness. And that’s the real issue.

But here’s something I’m just now realizing: even with all my control and all my systems, God has always been more powerful. It has always just been His plan despite my attempts to manage everything.

Looking back now, I can see how the failure of every productivity system I tried, every attempt I made to control outcomes, every anxious spiral I fell into—it was likely all to bring me to this point of trusting Him. My systems had to fail so I could learn that He’s the only system that works.

I don’t know that for certain. That’s God’s thing to know, not mine. But I’m starting to see the pattern.

What Ephesians 1 Is Teaching Me

And then I hit Ephesians 1:4-5:

“...even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will...” (ESV)

Wait. Hold on.

Before the foundation of the world.

Before I took my first breath. Before I built my first productivity system. Before I tried to control every variable in my life—God chose me.

Not because I optimized well enough. Not because I controlled things perfectly. Not because I earned it or proved I was adequate.

He chose me because He wanted to.

And then Paul keeps going in verses 11-12:

“In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.”

He works ALL THINGS according to the counsel of His will.

Not some things. Not the big things. Not just the spiritual things.

All things.

Which means my desperate attempts to control every aspect of my life are... what exactly? Am I trying to out-plan the God who planned salvation before time began?

The Same Power That Raised Jesus

Here’s what really hit me today, though. Paul prays in Ephesians 1:19-20 that we would know:

“...what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead...”

The same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in me.

The. Same. Power.

Not my willpower. Not my optimization. Not my carefully constructed systems and habits.

God’s power.

And here’s the most freeing part: I don’t have to understand it. I don’t have to control it. I don’t have to make sure it works.

I just have to trust it.

The Revelation That’s Changing Everything

I had this revelation, and I’m not exaggerating when I say it took a lot of stress off my shoulders immediately after hearing it.

My job isn’t to control the future. My job isn’t to anxiously optimize every variable to prevent loss. My job isn’t to be adequate enough to earn the life I want or to never let anyone down.

My job is to show up fully today.

To live as Christlike as I can today. To maintain my health, my friendships, my relationship with Maddy, my family relationships today. To do my best work as if working for the Lord today (Colossians 3:23).

That’s it.

That’s all.

God will take care of tomorrow. And next week. And next month. And next year. And five years from now. And ten years from now.

I don’t have to worry about any of it. I don’t even have to understand His plan. I just have to let Him put me where He wants me.

And right now, I know He wants me exactly where I am.

Do you know how freeing that is?

Money is a perfect example. I’ve struggled with a small amount of credit card debt for most of my adult moved-out life, constantly stressed that we’d go under, that I’d never have enough. I tried every optimization strategy, every budget system, every way to control it myself.

Finally, I stopped trying to optimize it on my own and trusted the Lord with it. And you know what? I just paid it all off. Once I stopped white-knuckling the control, God handled it.

The Anxiety Reminder: 365 Times

There’s a reason “do not be anxious” appears in the Bible 365 times—once for every day of the year.

God knew we’d need that reminder. Daily.

I still struggle with anxiety. I still feel that pull toward control, toward optimization-driven-by-fear, toward white-knuckling my way through life.

But here’s what I’m discovering: when I actually give that control to God—when I pray and hand it over, or even just acknowledge “this is God’s plan”—the anxiety goes away. That simple recognition—that He’s in control and I’m not—brings immediate relief when I actually believe it and surrender.

The problem? I don’t do that consistently yet. Most of the time, I take the control back from Him. I slip back into trying to manage everything myself.

This is going to be a long road. Learning to trust, learning to let go of control, learning to lean fully on Jesus instead of my own strength—it’s not a one-time decision. It’s a daily practice. A daily battle.

What I’m really fighting is my flesh that doesn’t want to submit. That flesh has been fed for my entire life—21 years of believing the lie that I’m the one who has to hold everything together. And I’m just now starting to deny it. Just now beginning to starve those old patterns and feed new ones.

And honestly, I know I’ll never fully give over this control to God, no matter how hard I try. Because I still have flesh. As Paul says in Romans 7:19, “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

I do the things I don’t want to do. I don’t do the things I want to do. That’s the reality of living in this broken body.

But here’s the thing: I don’t have to be the one with the strength.

My struggle for control hasn’t worked. My systems haven’t worked. My attempts to manage everything haven’t worked.

But I know—I KNOW—that His power is available to me. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead. I’m not relying on my strength to overcome this. I’m learning to lean on His.

An Invitation

If you’re reading this and you’re a control freak like me—if you’re anxious about the future, if you’re terrified of losing what you have, if you’re exhausted from trying to earn your worth through perfect performance—I want you to know something:

You’re not alone.

I’m right here with you, fighting the same battle.

But more importantly, you can lean on God’s strength. Not your own. His.

And we should all encourage each other to keep leaning on that. To keep surrendering. To keep trusting even when our flesh wants to take control back.

Because here’s the truth:

If God chose you before the foundation of the world, your worth isn’t based on your performance.

If God works all things according to His will, your anxiety can’t change the outcome anyway.

If the same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, you don’t have to rely on your own strength.

You just have to trust Him.

I’ll probably do a deeper Ephesians study on here at some point—really break down the theology and what Paul’s saying in these packed verses. If that’s something you’d want to read, subscribe or reach out and I’ll let you know when I post it.

To Close — I want you all to know what I have learned, control is an illusion. Trust is a daily choice. And God is faithful even when I’m not.