let go

If you cling to your life, you will lose it;

but if you give it up for me, you will find it.

Matthew 10:39

I remember back when it seemed God gave me that verse for the upcoming year.

My initial reaction was “oh, crap.”

(I am SUCH a spiritual giant.)

;-) LOL

I thought oh crap, I'm gonna have to give up something or everything AGAIN.

I'm gonna have to lose something BIG this year.

(I have such a willing, servant's heart.)

Riiiight...

Anyway, I went with it.

That year God seemed to be leading me to take a pretty big step of faith...

...a step of faith that I didn't think I would be allowed to take, let alone if I could pull it off.

But you know how God is – once He says something, He doesn't let up.

He just keeps quietly saying it over & over.

As I walked toward taking the step of faith He was leading me toward, I had all kinds of questions, mostly ones that started with “But what if...”.

Each time there was a “what if” question came up, His response was the same - “don't cling to your life”.

And there were times I asked another question - “But how...”.

You guessed it... His response was always “don't cling to your life”.

All that year I let go one at a time of my preconceived ideas,

my worries about what if this person said or thought this,

& how I was going to pull this off or how I was going to work out this situation or bring on board that person.

I just kept walking toward what I felt He was leading me toward.

I had to let go of my life as it had been, & move toward the seemingly impossible thing He had for me.

So what happened?

We moved the 20something ministry to a warehouse in the downtown area of Macon.

We started a satellite Sunday morning fellow of the mother church.

Our 20something ministry spiked 100%.

And we ministered to people we never would have reached w/o a presence in the downtown.

These were some of the most halcyon days of my life.

And I never would have obeyed God to move to Blairsville if I hadn't had the experience of moving downtown.

You see, at the beginning of the year, all I saw was the first part of that verse – I didn't see the second part.

I only saw that I was gonna have to give up a lot of stuff, again.

I didn't see that I might be getting something.

I found out that year that if we let go of our lives,

it frees God to make happen the dreams He dreamed for each of us a gajillion years before we were born.

...don't cling to your life.