Letting Go

During these last few months since I have written, God has been speaking to my heart about letting go. Letting go isn’t as easy as it sounds. There are so many things that we have to let go of in life and none of them are easy to do. As a parent we have to learn to slowly let go and give our children independence as they grow and then eventually allow them to become adults. But the letting go that I am referring most to, is what the Lord requires of us. There is a continual letting go when we are forgiving those who trespass against us on a daily basis, but there is also a letting go of the past. Though we are forgiven, we walk around carrying a burden like we would carry a suitcase that is so full it is difficult to carry.

So when God told me that it is time to let go I didn't quite know what to think about it. I was praying and I asked himt what it was that I am supposed to let go of? Over the next few nights I couldn't go to sleep. I stayed awake thinking about the things that I had not quite let go of in my life. I was surprised to find out just how much baggage that I had been carrying around with me. These things were not sins that I struggled with but rather they are things that I had not dealt with emotionally. I am the type of person that I will push aside things that hurt me and deal with them later, but generally later doesn't come until I have so much piled up that I nearly burst.

These past four years have been very difficult for me. I faced many emotinal things that I pushed aside to deal with later: graduating college but never really celebrating my acomplishment, getting a full time job that is an emotionally stressful job, buying a house, having a parent become seriously ill, having my parents live with me and helping them transition to moving back out on their own, having a close relationship that I thought was the person God had for me end because God told me this person was not the one for me, losing my house in a foreclosure, moving, watching my best friend become serious ill and not being able to be there for her because I was ill and the list could go on and on.

The fact is I didn't allow myself to cry because I was tired of crying myself to sleep at night. I didn't allow myself to mourn my losses. It is still very difficult for me, as I sit here typing this in Borders I force myself not to become emotional. Where did this come from, this idea to hold it in and not let it out because it hurts? Hard heartedness...if I don't face it it won't hurt. God began to point out to me that I need to let it go emotionally so that he can move in my life in a way that I have been wanting him to. I made a decision a long time ago that I was tired of being hurt, tired of crying and because of that I choose not to deal with painful things.

I believe that we all do that to an extent. We must choose to let it go brothers and sisters. If want God to heal us and to take us to the next level, we have to let it go! Jesus said: "Come to me all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, let me teach you because I am humble and gentle at heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear and the burden I give you is light" (Matthew 11:28-30). Jesus does not want us to walk around carrying guilt, shame, hurts, heartache, pain of lost dreams, etc...He wants us to be free to run this race without anything holding us back from what he has called us to. We have to make a choice and I am choosing to LET IT GO!