276 The List and The Letting Go

How to Bring Your Heart’s Desires to a Father Who Knows Better

Jul 13, 2026

Good morning, and hello friends.

Let’s talk about prayer. Not the formal, distant kind, but the raw, running conversation between a child and a good Father. The kind that happens in the shower, on a drive, in the quiet of a morning journal. It’s in these spaces where faith is lived, not just theorized.

I found myself writing one of those prayers recently. It started like they often do, with gratitude. Thank you for the roof, the peace, the family (even the ones I struggle with), the clean clothes, the cleansing. Gratitude, I’m learning, is the soil where trust grows.

Then, almost sheepishly, the list began to form. The needs. The wants. The “I would likes…” Cell phone bills, car repairs, insurance, dreams of a camper van and a new life in a cool place, vet visits, household bills. The mundane and the monumental, all jumbled together. The math even came to mind: $300k conservatively, $500k generously.

And right there, in the ink on the page, the lesson presented itself. This is the pivot point of true faith. The moment where our child-like asking meets our child-like trust.

We are commanded to ask. Yahusha was unequivocal: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7, ESV). He framed it in the most tender terms: what human father, when his son asks for bread, gives him a stone? “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:9-11, ESV).

So we bring our list. We are meant to. But we must bring it with the right heart. We bring it not as demands to an ATM, but as confessions to a Dad. We bring it with the preface that frames everything: “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

This is the sacred surrender. It is saying, “Father, here are the things my limited human eyes see as needs. The broken car, the looming bill, the dream of a fresh start. I am bringing them to your feet not because I know better than You what is good for me, but because I trust You completely. Your will is always better for me than my will.”

This aligns perfectly with the other pillar of His teaching: “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33, ESV). Our asking isn’t divorced from our seeking. We ask for provision within the context of seeking His Kingdom. The prayer journal showed this: gratitude first, then the list, then the immediate surrender of that list to His will and His mission. The request for clarity of mind, for strength against unclean compulsions, for words to disciple a friend, for healing for a neighbor, these are Kingdom-seeking prayers. They are about becoming the person He wants me to be, right where I am.

This is the confidence John speaks of: “And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him” (1 John 5:14-15, ESV).

Asking “according to his will” isn’t a magic incantation. It is the slow, daily work of aligning my desires with His. It is wanting His glory more than I want my comfort. It is wanting His timing over my urgency. It is trusting that the “good things” He promises (Matthew 7:11) may look different from my $500k dream. They may be the peace to endure the wait. The creativity to solve the problem. The community to support the need. Or the quiet “no” that protects me from a path that would ultimately shipwreck my faith.

So, we make our lists. We be specific. We are honest about our dreams for a van, for a cool place, for freedom from debt. This is the “asking.” But then, we must practice the “letting go.” We place the list at His feet and say, “Not my will, but Yours.” We trade anxiety for petition wrapped in thanksgiving (Philippians 4:6).

The detox mentioned in the journal…the physical cleansing, is a powerful picture of the spiritual process. As the toxins leave the body, clarity emerges. As we surrender our will, our anxieties, our demanding spirits to Him, a clarity of mind and purpose emerges. We start to see our needs through His eyes. The list doesn’t disappear, but it ceases to be a source of worry. It becomes a subject for trustful conversation.

This is the daily walk. The daily grain of sand. Bringing our humanity, our bills, our dreams, our struggles with family and compulsions…into the presence of the Divine, and leaving transformed. Not because we got the van, but because we got more of Him in the process. And He is, always, the ultimate provision.

A Prayer of List and Letting Go:

Father Most High,
Thy will be done, here in my life, just as it is perfectly done in heaven.
Thank you. For the breath in my lungs, the roof over my head, the people you’ve placed in my path, for all of it, the easy and the hard.
Here is my heart, laid bare before you.
Here are my needs, both great and small: the practical burdens of this month, the dreams that feel too big, the relationships that need your mending, the healing my body and spirit crave.
I present them to you, not as one who knows better, but as a child who trusts.
I seek first your Kingdom and your righteousness. Align my desires with Yours.
If my dream is from You, pave the way and I will walk in it with joy.
If it is not, gently close the door and give me a heart of patient, expectant peace.
Help me to be sober-minded, loving, and useful in Your hands today.
Speak through me to those who need to hear from You.
I ask all these things, in full confidence of Your goodness and perfect will, in the mighty name of Yahusha the Messiah.
Amen.