When You Finally Stop Trying to Write Your Own Story
Opening Story: I Kept Grabbing the Pen
I'm a man who likes to know how things are going to go.
Not because I'm a control freak. Because I care deeply about outcomes. About people. About getting it RIGHT. And when you care about getting it right, it's very hard to hand the pen to someone else and just... trust the story He's writing.
So for years, I edited. I revised. I argued with the draft. I crossed out chapters that felt too painful and tried to write my own endings to things God hadn't finished yet.
I kept grabbing the pen.
And every time I took it? The story got worse. Not because I'm a bad person — because I'm not the Author. I don't know what Chapter 12 needs in order for Chapter 20 to land. I don't know which painful subplot becomes the turning point. I don't know which loss becomes the lesson that saves someone else.
I live in a moment He already wrote. I keep forgetting that.
Here's what wrecked me about Brandon Lake and Nick Jonas bringing this together:
Two different guys. Two wildly different backgrounds. One grew up in the church — a poor preacher's son. One grew up in the spotlight — a child star chasing glory on the world's biggest stages. Same question. Same struggle. Same Author.
"Who am I? Am I just a poor preacher's prodigal son? A troubled child, running wild, chasing the glory instead of the One?"
Brandon's asking it from the inside of the church. Nick's asking it from the outside. And the answer is the same for both of them.
Neither of them gets to question the pen in the hands of the Author. And neither do I.
Because here's the thing about MY story: I didn't write May 13, 2021. I didn't write PPA into my plot. I didn't write "there's still so much for you to do" into the mouth of God when I was on the other side of death. I didn't write any of that.
He did. And He's still writing.
Which means the chapter I'm IN right now — the one where He's asking for MORE when I have LESS — He wrote that too. Not as punishment. Not as oversight. As purposeful plot.
The Author doesn't write wasted pages. Every page moves the story forward.
Even the ones that hurt to read.
Essence of My Experience
"Picked up the Book for the first time in ages / Still washed me clean with the dust on the pages"—this is the grace that gets me every time.
You don't have to come back CLEAN. The coming back IS what cleans you.
The dust on the pages doesn't stop the Word from working. The gap in your relationship with it doesn't diminish its power. You pick it back up — wherever you are, however long you've been gone — and it still washes you.
That's not religion. That's the Author tending His story.
"My life is a story I struggle to write / But is it one worth telling? Is it one You like?"—I've asked this question. More than once. More than I'd like to admit.
Is this story worth telling? With PPA in it. With the wasted years before 2021 in it. With the anger and confusion and depression that came AFTER the call in it. With all the pages that don't look like what a "ministry story" is supposed to look like?
Is it one You like?
And I think the answer He keeps giving me is: It's not finished yet. Don't review a book by the chapter you're in.
"I lost the plot every time I played God"—Nick Jonas wrote this line from his own life. But it might as well be tattooed on mine.
Every time I grabbed the pen. Every time I tried to resolve a storyline on MY timeline. Every time I edited out something painful that turned out to be essential. I lost the plot.
Because playing God in your own story doesn't make you the hero. It makes you a bad author.
And I'm not the Author. I'm ink in the pen of the One who is.
"I live in a moment You already wrote / It's proof that I'm someone, yeah, someone You love"—this is the theological pivot in the whole song.
The fact that God already wrote this moment — not as predeterminism that removes my agency, but as sovereign love that KNOWS me — is PROOF that I'm someone He loves.
He doesn't write stories about people He doesn't care about. He doesn't write characters He considers throwaway. If He wrote this moment into my story, it's because He has something for it to DO.
PPA in my story? He already wrote it. And He's not wasting the page.
"I see trauma, I see worthless / You see something You can work with"—the bridge of this song is extraordinary. Because it captures the DUAL VISION perfectly.
What I see when I look at myself: Trauma. Weakness. Failure. Ashes.
What He sees when He looks at me: Raw material. Something good on paper. Something He can work WITH.
Not "despite your trauma." WITH your trauma as part of the story.
Not "overlooking your weakness." Working THROUGH your weakness because weakness is often the most interesting part of the narrative.
"I've seen ashes turn to beauty / I've felt heaven working through me / I've seen panic turn to power / Felt Your peace in my darkest hour"—I've lived every line of this bridge. Every single one.
Ashes turning to beauty: That's my whole post-2021 story. Heaven working through me: That's every Lift that reached someone I'll never meet. Panic turning to power: That's the moment I stopped fighting the diagnosis and started using the urgency it created. Peace in my darkest hour: That's every morning I've woken up inside this condition and still felt covered.
"What grace is this? Called me by name again and again and again"—He doesn't call you once and move on. He doesn't call you by name at your highest moment and then go quiet. He calls you by name AGAIN AND AGAIN.
May 13, 2021 was one calling. But He's been calling my name every day since. In the assignment. In the Lifts. In the "I want more from you." In the "there's still so much to do."
Again and again and again. Not because I earned the repeated calling. Because that's who the Author IS.
"Crossed out my shame / Forgives me again and again and again"—the Author doesn't just write new chapters over your shame. He CROSSES IT OUT. Actively. Intentionally. The shame doesn't stay on the page.
He edits it out. Not because it didn't happen. Because it's not your story anymore.
"I'm ink in the pen in the hands of the Author"—the outro destroyed me.
Not the hand. The ink.
I'm not even the PEN. I'm the INK. The most yielded, most dependent, most completely surrendered element of the writing process. The pen goes where the Author directs. The ink just flows.
That's the posture. Not resistance. Flow.
🎯 The Real Truth: Where Theology Meets Real Life
You're Not the Author — But You're IN the Story On Purpose
"Who am I to question the pen in the hands of the Author?"—this isn't resignation. This is the most freeing truth in Scripture.
Isaiah 46:10 declares: "I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say, 'My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.'"
"The end from the beginning."
He already knows how this story ends. He already knows what Chapter 20 needs from Chapter 7. He already knows which painful page becomes the turning point for you AND for the people reading your life.
You don't question the Author. You trust that the One who knows the end is writing Chapter 11 with the ending in mind.
Your story isn't random. It's authored.
Playing God in Your Own Story Always Loses the Plot
"I lost the plot every time I played God"—there's a reason this hits so hard.
Proverbs 19:21 says it plainly: "Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails."
You can plan all you want. You can grab the pen and write your preferred draft. But the Lord's purpose prevails.
Not because your plans don't matter. Because the Author's story is better than your edit.
Every time I've tried to write my own ending — tried to resolve a painful storyline on my timeline, tried to skip a chapter that felt unnecessary, tried to rush the pacing of something He was writing slowly — I've made the story worse.
Let Him write it. The plot works better when you stop playing God.
"Something You Can Work With" Is More Gracious Than You Know
"You see something You can work with"—there's a potter's workshop image in Scripture that unlocks this line.
Jeremiah 18:4 records: "But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him."
"Marred in his hands" — already broken. Already messed up. Already not what it was supposed to be.
"Formed it into another pot." Not thrown away. Reworked.
The marred clay is still clay. The broken story is still a story. The Author doesn't discard broken manuscripts — He reworks them into something better than the original draft.
Your trauma, your failures, your detours? You're not disqualified. You're marred clay in the hands of the Potter who sees something He can work with.
The Dual Vision: What You See vs. What He Sees
"I see trauma, I see worthless / You see something You can work with / I see weakness, I see failure / You see something good on paper"—this is 2 Corinthians 12:9 made personal.
"But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.'"
"Made PERFECT in weakness."
Not "despite weakness." IN it. THROUGH it. PERFECTED by it.
When you see weakness — He sees the exact condition His power needs to demonstrate itself most clearly.
When you see failure — He sees the plot point that makes the redemption arc undeniable.
You're reading your story wrong. You need His eyes.
Ink in the Pen — The Most Surrendered Posture
"I'm ink in the pen in the hands of the Author"—this outro isn't just a lyric. It's a theology of surrender.
Romans 9:21 asks the defining question: "Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?"
The clay doesn't tell the potter what to make. The ink doesn't tell the pen where to go. The yielded thing surrenders to the One holding it.
Ink in the pen means: I go where He points. I flow where He directs. I leave a mark where He presses down. And I trust that what's being written is worth the page.
That's not passive. That's the most active form of faith — choosing yielded-ness over and over when every instinct says grab the pen.
Reflection Questions
- "Is it one worth telling? Is it one You like?"—do you believe your story is worth telling? With ALL of it in there — the painful chapters, the detours, the wasted years? What would it mean to trust that the Author LIKES the story He's writing in you?
- "I lost the plot every time I played God"—where have you grabbed the pen? Where are you still trying to edit a chapter He hasn't finished? What did "playing God" in your story cost you?
- "I live in a moment You already wrote"—can you sit with the idea that THIS moment — the hard one, the confusing one, the one that doesn't make sense — was already written by an Author who knows the ending? What does that change?
- "I see trauma, I see worthless / You see something You can work with"—which vision are you living from? Your self-assessment or His? What would it look like to borrow His eyes for one day?
- "I'm ink in the pen in the hands of the Author"—what does ink-level surrender look like in your life practically? Not pen-level (still some control) — but INK-level, where you go where He points and trust what's being written?
This Lift is for everyone who's been arguing with the story God is writing. For everyone who sees trauma where He sees raw material. For everyone who's been playing God in their own plot and wondering why it stopped making sense. Give back the pen. You're ink in the hands of the Author. And He doesn't waste a single page. 🔥✨
