Letting Go

No retreat, no surrender!

Never give up!

We all have our favorite way of saying (or least favorite way of hearing it), but they all boil down to one thing: pull yourself together, toughen up, and fight through it.

This is probably more prominent with us men. Many of us grew up with the “macho tough guy” expectation. We weren’t supposed to show it if we got hurt. We were supposed to be rough and ready…

Good at sports…

Snips, snails, and puppy dog tails…

And, heaven forbid you would start to cry, because men who cry are…

…well, I’ll let you fill in the blank. Whatever word you heard used there, it was something you were NOT supposed to be as a male, especially growing up to be a MAN.

Now, I did not grow up with those expectations. I was allowed to be me.

I wasn’t very good at sports. I was pretty clumsy, as a matter of fact.

I got hurt and let it show.

I cried and nobody thought twice – at least nobody in the family.

Out there, it was a different story.

But somehow, over the years, I lost those things I had as a boy and a young man.

I didn’t get any better at sports – that would have been too easy.

But I did start to suppress being hurt.

I buried my feelings.

I did my dead level best to let nothing get to me – that part of my being that was still so vulnerable.

It happened gradually. I hardly even noticed it, in fact, until I got to the point where I found I couldn’t cry anymore, at least not like I used to.

I have been taking the risk and sharing what I am going through with ADHD.

Last Friday, I found out I have ADHD symptoms without ADHD.

So…. Okay…

And that means?

Oh, maybe anxiety or stress.

Ah, the old favorites – anxiety and stress.

And what do I do with that?

I kinda lost it last Friday. I sat in church and prayed. I laid it all out for God (as if He didn’t already know):

I feel useless.

How can I function when I can’t even remember what I’m doing sometimes from one room to the next?

How do I take care of things around the house?

How do I help my wife?

How do I function as a pastor?

How do I…?

You get the drift.

It took a day of ruminating on this, but I finally got an answer from God. In the form of a question.

“You want to know how you deal with this…”

“Who said you had to?”

I had planned a message on Jeremiah 18 (the potter and the clay) for Sunday the 29th, but just got the feeling it needed to be pushed back a week.

Now I understood why.

God started to deal with me. He sat me down (not literally – I was in the car driving at the time) and laid out a few facts for me.

Facts I already knew, but needed reminded of anyway.

“I made everything you see around you.”

“I made you, and I was happy to see what I made.”

“I followed you through a bunch of pretty awful stuff for 20 years while you were trying to push me away.”

“I was right there when you came to your senses like the prodigal son in the mud with the pigs.”

“I was right there, and I ran to meet you and took you in my arms.”

“I have brought you through a lot in the last seven years of ministry.”

“Now, life has torn through your space and left some broken pieces laying around. You’re upset, I get it.”

“But, think about it. Do you really think I see all these pieces laying around and don’t already know what I want to do with them?”

“Thing is, son, I want to do something great with those pieces, but I can’t as long as you’re hanging on to them.”

Then I did something I haven’t done often in the past several years.

I cried.

I didn’t just have tears in my eyes for a minute.

I cried.

I realized it wasn’t just those pieces I was holding on to.

I was holding on to a lot of the past.

I was holding on to things that had gone wrong.

I was holding on to situations where I had been wronged.

I was holding on to things that meant nothing anymore,

except to a some little part of me that kept hold of them

…as if they were something precious.

So I let go.

I let it all go … and it was okay.

I didn’t spontaneously combust.

I didn’t dry up and blow away with the wind.

I didn’t stop existing.

I didn’t suddenly become less than I was before.

You know what? I feel like I became MORE.

I shared this experience in the message Sunday morning and I could barely hold the tears in.

I find myself leaking from the eyes a lot easier, all of a sudden.

There is something about letting go, and then sharing the experience with others.

There is something about being vulnerable and not afraid.

It’s risky.

It’s scary.

I found myself hardly able to hold it in and terrified to let it out, all at the same time.

But there’s something about it.

It’s FREEING.

I don’t know if anyone reading this is going through something that is weighing them down.

But, if so, take it from me.

Holding on to it will only drag you down further and further.

There is nothing you can do with it.

But, there is someone who can.

God not only CAN do something with it, He’s just waiting for the chance.

But God can’t do what He wants to do until you let go.

Why hold on to broken things that aren’t good for anything?

Why not let them go and let God make them into something that will knock you for a loop.

He has done it before with me.

Time and time again He has done it.

I needed to be reminded of that.

And, at the same time, I managed to let go of a whole bunch of old baggage.

It’s not all processed yet – it will take some time.

But I know God is taking care of it and will be beside me while I do my part.

What more could I ask?

Give it a try.

There is strength in vulnerability.

There are riches in letting go.

God loves you. I love you. And there’s nothing you can do about it!