Monday, June 27, 2011

Let Go!

Have you ever noticed how we like to hang onto things?

All I have to do is look in my closet and see how I like to hang onto old clothes and old shoes. Things that I don't wear or need any longer are the hardest things to let go of.

It's not just things we wear that we hold onto. My husband has newspapers about Superbowl winnings from years ago. I cannot understand why he holds onto those things. It's not like they are worth any thing and what purpose does it serve to hang onto them?

In life, we sometimes hang onto things that cause us harm. Old shoes and newspapers from decades ago probably would not fall into this category. But we as humans tend to hang onto old habits and bad memories that tend to bring harm to us.

This past week, I heard a preacher tell the following story:

As a young child, he went to the driving range with his dad. While he was too young to actually hit the balls, to give him something to do, his father let him go to the ball machine to fill the bucket full of golf balls. The young boy excitedly went to the ball machine, set the pail down and hit the button that dropped down the balls. As the balls filled up the bucket, he noticed one ball got loose and instead of dropping into the bucket it dropped down to the bottom of the machine. As any young boy would do, the preacher shared how he didn't want any balls to get away, so he reached down into the hole of the machine to retrieve that lost ball. Except for alittle problem...when he tried to pull his hand back out of the hole, it was stuck. Panicked, he started to holler. His mom came running to see what was the matter. As others gathered around him, they could see that his hand was stuck in the machine. Until one very smart individual asked,"do you have the ball in your hand?" To which the boy replied, "Yes, I have the ball!" Then he was told to "Let go of the ball!" So he did. And he was able to pull his hand right out of the hole.

Why is it so hard for us to let go of things? We are like the little preacher boy, we can't escape bad things in our life because we are holding onto the things that keep us trapped. We must learn to "let go" and just "let God!"

Psalm 25:2 "O my God , I trust in thee: let me not be ashamed, let not mine enemies triumph over me."

WHAT ARE YOU HOLDING ON TO?
Try letting go and see what God can do!

1 comment:

Shanda said...

Thank you for this reminder. I have things in my house I need to let go of but, more importantly, there are things in my heart!