I've Got This

I was pondering the incredible number of things on my plate—doing the mental math, wondering if there was any realistic way to get it all done. Deadlines. Details. Preparation for an upcoming weekend of ministry out of town. I felt way past my margins—already off the page. 

Then Trace walked in.

“Darling… my email isn’t working. Can you fix it?”

I answered as graciously as I could. “Could it wait until after next weekend? I’ve just got so much going on.”

She paused. “Well… okay. But I really need it, honey.”

And the moment I heard “honey,” I knew—I was toast. 

Cue the Mighty Mouse / Here-I-Come-to-Save-the-Day reflex. Some people call it my Jesus complex. I went straight into full fix-it mode. I assured her, “Of course I can do it. It’ll probably only take fifteen minutes.”

Famous. Last. Words.

Nine hours later—yes, nine—I was still toggling settings like a tech wizard with no wand. Frustrated. Running out of ideas. Running out of patience. I finally hit an impasse and crawled into bed at 1:45 a.m.

The next morning, before touching a keyboard, I had a revelation that gave me a fresh perspective. I had been trying this project with an “I’ve got this” approach rather than “Seek first.” 

Maybe it was time to start practicing what I preach. 

Our theme for 2026 is Prayer • Praise • Presence.  Yet I was working in my own strength and my own knowledge. Not praying. Certainly not praising. And very aware that I was not practicing God’s presence.

So I prayed: 

“Lord, I don’t know what to do—but my eyes are on You. Forgive me for not consulting You first… for not practicing what I preach.”

I paused. I thanked God. I felt His presence.

And then—clarity. 

It “hit me” that the information I’d been using was outdated by nearly two years. I shifted to current resources. Progress. When I got stuck again, I asked the Lord. The answer was simple and precise:

“You’re trying to update something that needs to be deleted and reconfigured.”

I did exactly that.

And just like that—bada-boom, bada-bing.  After ten hours, my fifteen-minute “quick fix” was… fixed.

There’s a reason Jesus tells us to seek first the Kingdom. There’s a reason we pray, praise, and live in His presence:

“For in Him we live and move and have our being.”  — Acts 17:28

Blessed are the poor in spirit—those who recognize their need for Him. The Beatitudes remind us that we are blessed not when we are strong, but when we know we need God.

As we head into 2026, the challenges ahead will be exponentially larger than broken email forwarding. We’ll be tempted to say, “I’ve got this.”  But self-sufficiency will not suffice.

Here’s what will sustain us:

---

• Prayer — Dependence That Invites Heaven

  
  

Prayer is how we admit our need and invite God’s rule into real life. When we pray, we’re not stalling—we’re aligning. God’s will is for broken things to be restored, but that work flows by His Spirit, not our hustle.

• “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness…” — Matthew 6:33

  
  

• “Apart from Me you can do nothing.” — John 15:5

  
  

Prayer acknowledges our need for God and invites His Kingdom to move from heaven into everyday life.

So we pray, "Your will be done." His will is that broken emails, broken families, broken lives, and broken governments are fixed — but it's not by our strength. 

• “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,” says the Lord. — Zechariah 4:6

  
  

➔  Prayer shifts us from ‘I’ve got this’ to ‘God’s got this.’

---

• The Holy Spirit — Power Beyond Ourselves

  
  

Jesus knew His disciples couldn’t fulfill their calling on their own. That’s why He told them to wait—to be clothed with power from on high. The same Spirit who advanced the Kingdom in the first century is the Spirit we need today.

• “It is to your advantage that I go away;… I will send Him (the Holy Spirit) to you.” — John 16:7

  
  

• “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” — Acts 1:8

  
  

• “When the Holy Spirit, who is truth, comes, he shall guide you into all truth.” — John 16:13

  
  

➔ God never intended self-effort to replace Spirit-empowerment.

---

• Humility — God-Confidence, Not Self-Confidence

  
  

The answer to rugged individualism isn’t weak collectivism—it’s strong individuals whose strength comes from the Lord. 

Humility isn’t thinking less of ourselves; it’s thinking of ourselves less—and trusting God more.

• “God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.” — James 4:6

  
  

• “When I am weak, then I am strong.” — 2 Corinthians 12:10

  
  

• “Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God…” — 1 Peter 5:6

  
  

➔ True humility trades self-confidence for God-confidence.

---

When we say “I’ve got this,” we’re on our own. It sounds confident—but it quietly cuts us off from

Holy Spirit wisdom and power.

Scripture invites us to something better.

Jesus doesn’t say figure it out first. He says, "Seek first.”

When we seek first the Kingdom—through prayer, praise, and His presence—we stop striving and start aligning ourselves with the God who is able.

We move forward not with self-confidence, but with God-confidence, because He is able “to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.” — Ephesians 3:20

Let’s seek first the Kingdom, stand in prayer, lift up praise, and walk in the presence of the God who’s got this.