What I'm Learning About Letting Go of What Was Never Mine

A few months ago, I caught myself doing the thing again.

I was planning something small — nothing dramatic, just an event I was helping coordinate — and I noticed my mind had quietly drifted into a familiar place. Running scenarios. Anticipating every possible way it could go wrong. Mentally drafting contingency plans for contingency plans. And underneath all of it, if I'm honest, a low hum of anxiety about how many people would actually show up, whether it would go well, whether it would be received the way I hoped.

I do this more than I'd like to admit. With events. With emails I send out and quietly wonder if anyone opened. With how certain people respond to me, work with me, or against me. With this very blog and ministry I'm building — will anyone read it, will it matter, will it grow the way I hope.

God has been gently, patiently working on this in me for a while now. And what He keeps bringing me back to is something so simple it almost feels too small to be the answer, except that it keeps changing everything: I cannot control the outcome of anything. I never could. I was only ever asked to be faithful with what's actually mine to carry.

What Am I Actually Trying to Control That Was Never Mine?

I think what I've actually been doing, underneath the overplanning and the micromanaging, is trying to hold onto things that were never mine to hold in the first place.

How many people show up. How an email performs. How someone chooses to treat me. How quickly something grows. Whether people understand my heart the way I intend it. I've spent so much energy trying to manage outcomes that were never within my control to begin with — and exhausting myself in the process, because you cannot actually manage what was never yours to manage. You can only wear yourself out trying.

There's a verse I've returned to over and over as God has been working on this in me. Psalm 24:1 says:

"The earth is the LORD's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it." (BSB)

Everything in it. Not just the earth in some abstract, cosmic sense — the actual outcomes of my actual days. The event turnout. The email open rate. The way this ministry grows or doesn't. The response of the people in my life. All of it already belongs to Him. I was never the owner of any of it. I was only ever invited to be faithful with what's placed directly in my hands, and to trust Him with everything else.

That distinction — what's mine to carry versus what's His to hold — has become one of the most freeing things I've learned in a long time. And I'm still learning it. I don't want to pretend I've arrived here. I catch myself slipping back into the old pattern more often than I'd like. But I'm learning, slowly, to notice when I'm gripping something that was never mine, and to open my hands.

What the Parable of the Talents Actually Says to Me

You probably know the parable in Matthew 25 — a master entrusts his servants with talents before going on a journey, and when he returns, he asks what they did with what they were given. Two servants invested what they'd been given and it multiplied. One buried his out of fear and returned only what he'd started with.

I used to read this story and focus almost entirely on the outcome — the multiplication, the increase, the return on investment. But the longer I've sat with it, especially in this season of learning to release control, the more I notice something different. The master doesn't ask his servants to guarantee a specific result. He entrusts them with something and asks them to be faithful with it. What they do with what's in their hands is theirs to steward. What comes of it — the growth, the multiplication — unfolds through a process much bigger than their effort alone.

"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master.'" (Matthew 25:21, BSB)

Well done, good and faithful servant. Not well done, servant who controlled every variable and guaranteed the outcome. Faithful. That's the word. Faithful with what was placed in their hands.

I think about this often now when I sit down to write a blog post, or plan something for church, or show up to serve at Apartment Life. My job was never to guarantee that the post resonates, that the event is well attended, that the ministry grows the way I hope. My job is to be faithful with what's actually mine — the writing, the showing up, the effort, the heart I bring to it. The rest belongs to God. It always did.

Where This Has Actually Shown Up for Me

I want to be specific about this, because I think it's easy to nod along with the concept and harder to actually see where it applies.

In our Apartment Life ministry, I used to carry so much weight around things I genuinely could not control — whether a neighbor responded to an invitation, whether an event I planned was well attended, whether the relationships we were building actually went anywhere. Learning to release that has brought a kind of peace I didn't expect. I can be faithful to show up, to build the relationship, to plan the event with care. Whether it "works" the way I pictured isn't mine to carry.

In serving at church, the same lesson keeps showing up. I can prepare well, show up with a willing heart, and pour into the women I'm serving. Whether they engage the way I hope, whether the turnout is what I'd planned for — that was never within my control, and holding it like it was just left me anxious instead of present.

At home, this might be where it's hardest and most necessary. I can't control how my children respond to correction, how a hard conversation with my husband lands, whether a decision we make together turns out the way we hope. I can be faithful — present, intentional, loving — and release my grip on how it unfolds.

And with this blog and this ministry I'm building right now, writing this very post — I can't control whether it grows, whether it resonates, whether anyone reads it at all. I can only be faithful to write what God has put on my heart, with as much care and honesty as I have, and trust Him with everything after that. Some days that trust comes easily. Other days I'm back to running scenarios in my head at eleven at night. I'm not claiming to have mastered this. I'm just telling you what I'm learning, one loosened grip at a time.

What I'm Trying to Practice

I don't have a formula for this, and I don't want to hand you one, because honestly I'm still figuring it out myself. But there's a small thing I've started noticing lately — a kind of quiet check I find myself doing without even meaning to, somewhere in the middle of the overplanning or the anxious scenario-running. I'll catch myself gripping something tightly, and something in me will ask, almost involuntarily now: is this actually mine to carry, or am I trying to hold something that He alone controls?

Most of the time, when I'm honest, it's the second one. And naming that — just naming it, not even fully resolving it — tends to loosen my grip a little. Not always all the way. But enough to breathe. Enough to remember that faithfulness was never the same thing as control.

Luke 16:10 says, "Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much." I used to read that as pressure — get the little things right so you're ready for bigger things. Lately I've been reading it differently. Faithfulness in the small, ordinary, controllable things — showing up, doing the next right thing, bringing my whole heart to what's actually in front of me — that's the whole assignment. The much, the outcome, the growth — that's His to bring, in His timing, in His way.

Still Learning, Still Letting Go

I don't want to leave you with the impression that I've figured this out. I haven't. I still catch myself micromanaging things that were never mine to manage. I still feel that familiar anxious pull toward controlling how something turns out. But I'm learning to notice it faster than I used to, and to open my hands a little sooner each time.

If you're someone who carries the same weight — trying to control outcomes that were never yours to control, exhausting yourself trying to manage what only God can actually hold — I want you to hear what I keep having to relearn: the earth and everything in it already belongs to Him. You were only ever asked to be faithful with what's in your hands. The rest was always His to carry.

Open your hands, friend. Let Him hold what was never yours to hold.

If this resonated, I'd love to have you subscribe and become a member of my community — you'll get The Sunday Sabbath in your inbox every week, plus the ability to reply and share your own story right here on the blog. Come sit on the porch a little longer.

If this stirred something in you, I'd love to hear it — reply and tell me what this brought up for you, or share your own story below. This is a space to process together, not just read alone.