Where is the greatest, safest, most satisfying place in the world to be? In the very center of God’s will, that’s where! So why not move there—like ASAP. And here’s a prayer that’s a great first step in making the move in that direction: “Father, not my will, but yours be done!”

Enduring Truth // Focus: Matthew 26:39

Jesus went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

Where is the greatest, safest, most satisfying place in the world to be? In the very center of God’s will, that’s where!

When we can learn to not only pray, but earnestly desire God’s will for our lives—unpleasant and undesired circumstances notwithstanding—then we will have discovered what Jesus knew all along when he prayed that prayer on the very night he was betrayed: The Divine “eye” of the Satanic storm.

Jesus desired his Father’s will more than anything else—even life itself. He knew his purpose in life was to fulfill God’s plan: To redeem a lost world by his sacrificial death. He entrusted his own personal preferences to the One who not only works out all things for His own glory, but for the good of His children as well. (Romans 8:28) That’s why Jesus, whom Hebrews 12 calls, “the author and finisher of our faith,” looked at the cross with great joy. That’s why he endured this ghastly assignment heroically. That’s why he even despised the shame of hanging upon that cross like a death-row inmate. For Jesus knew that the path to the crown was by way of the cross. Now he has arrived and is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.

Have you come to that place where you can subjugate your own preferences to the will of God? When you can so entrust your life to the Father’s perfect plan, no matter what that means, you will have discovered, as Jesus did, the Divine eye in the midst of every Satanic storm. And that is the greatest, safest, most satisfying place in the world!

Take a moment to absorb how Hebrews 12:1-3 says it:

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses [Jesus and others who heroically fulfilled God’s will], let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.

Are you struggling with God’s will? Does it seem a little too much to handle? Keep your eye on Jesus! Consider what he went through! For if you endure your cross now, then afterwards comes the crown!

Before he was martyred by the Naizis, German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in a letter from prison, “Much that worries us beforehand can afterwards, quite unexpectedly, have a happy and simple solution… Things really are in a better hand than ours.”

That’s why Jesus’ prayer, “Father, not my will, but Yours be done,” is a really good prayer for you to pray. Your life—unpleasant and undesired circumstances notwithstanding—is in better hands than yours.

And after your cross, if you endure by doing the will of the Father, comes the crown.