LET GO OF EVERYTHING YOU ARE AFRAID TO LOSE

The other day we had the TV on watching about Star Wars. There were a number of scenes from the various movies. In one of them, Yoda is speaking to young Annakin Skywalker and tells him, “Let go of everything you are afraid to lose!”

Brothers and Sisters, KNOW THIS>>> There are often hidden Spiritual Truths contained in the worlds messages and even it’s entertainment. They are there so that they cannot say they NEVER KNEW!

I like what Tozer says about things like this. He is writing about God continually speaking, ever since He created everything; God Still Speaks. The problem is, we are not tuned to hear Him. Even when we do catch a portion of what He says, we FILTER it through our STUFF, all the events, prejudices, teachings, understandings, etc, that are in our lives.

We end up NOT KNOWING what He is saying. Tozer went on to say that he personally believed that every blessing, every piece of insight, every invention, everything that we consider coming from man, had it’s origin in God, only it was twisted by the above forces so that it became what we see today, EVEN in the false religions. It is for this reason we see some spiritual truth contained in almost every pagan religion in the world, even in the occult ones.

I agree with Tozer as God has shown me this many, many times.

The above quote is something we as Christians need to embrace. But what does it really mean? Yes, it means all those things we used to cling to before we got saved. But it means FAR MORE!

For the vast majority of us, after we got saved, we were told to read certain scriptures, certain books of the Bible in order to begin to understand God’s ways. Then we were “INDOCTRINATED” into whatever denominational ideology we were involved in. Because we did not know, nor were taught, any better, we listened and BELIEVED our pastors and teachers. (and some of us had prophets and apostles and evangelists to listen to as well) Then there were all of those Sunday school teachers, the deacons, and all the other leaders that “KNEW MORE” than we did.

Now, how many of us have re-evaluated all those teachings? How many of us cling to those teachings as they define us, who we are, what we believe, what kind of Christian we are?

Please do not think me to be brash, uncaring, or anything else like that. What truly defines us as Christians? Is it any of our doctrines? Is it any of our teachings? You may think so, but it is NOT. It is NOT our denominations, our beliefs, our understandings, our religious rites, our services, our worship or any other thing like this. It is NOT these things that will cause others to understand that we are Christians.

So why do we cling to all of those things?

Friends, we do not want to face the truth, the reality of what it will mean if we cease clinging to these things. If we cease clinging to all of these things to define our Christianity, we no longer can RELY ON OURSELVES! Here it is that especially, Modern Western Christianity has its failure. We rely on ourselves.

Jdg 21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.

This verse PERMEATES ALL that is Christianity in America and filters itself to almost all other countries due to the influence we have upon Christianity. It is also the reason why the vast majority of Christians do not live where God desires them to live. They cling to all the wrong things, all of those teachings, ideas, understandings, abilities, giftings, ministries, doctrines, rites, etc.

NONE of those things are worth relying on. All they are, are our understanding, our explanations of what WE consider Christianity it. But how often are they changed? I know in my own life every single one of these things has changed several times during the course of my life as a Christian.

Yet we as Christians, are so afraid of letting go of these things. Friends that is ALL they are, THINGS!!!

We want to think we can understand the Bible, understand the teachings it contains, analyze the scriptures and come up with explanations (even if they are supernatural {though many have done this to explain AWAY the miracles}) so that we might put God in our box of understanding.

Now before you go off, let me say that many who cling to these beliefs and things, BELIEVE that God is beyond our understanding, at least verbally. Yet when it comes to the reality of what they believe and how they act, the only things they cling to are those they can understand and explain.

So what are we to do? If we cling to all of these things, we are subject to deception, false doctrines and teachings, and possibly even apostasy. We are so afraid of looking like fools, of NOT BEING IN CONTROL that we cling to all of these things and end up being the fools we were afraid of looking like, for we have left the ONE and ONLY THING that will actually matter.

We cannot cling to the ideas of ministry, for praying for the sick and seeing them healed, for preaching and teaching, for helping the poor, widows and orphans, for when Jesus will return, for who will go through the tribulation, when it starts, how it ends and where we will be; NONE OF THESE THINGS MATTER unless we want to be in control.

If we cling to all of these ideas, what happens if and when God teaches us that we are wrong? (for we WILL be wrong at some point and HE WILL teach us His truth IF WE WILL LISTEN) There have been a few I have run into who have spoken against the idea of laying down everything. Why? What are they afraid of? Are they afraid that God cannot teach us His Truth? Are they afraid that they will be deceived? How can we be deceived if we refuse to trust ANYONE except the Lord INCLUDING ourselves?

Could it be that they are afraid of not being in control? For I tell you the truth, one of the greatest sins that exists today is Judges 21:25. There is no true KING in their lives and they do what is right in their OWN eyes. Most of us do NOT seek God for Himself but only for those things that He can give us.

As long as we cling to those things we are afraid to lose we will be lost! (not necessarily in the eternal sense, but in the direction we are taking)

The ONLY thing we must cling to is the ONE THING we cannot lose. We can give it back, we can deny it, we can refuse to accept it, BUT WE CANNOT LOSE IT!

This ONE THING is Jesus Christ in us, the HOPE of Glory! (AND HE MUST BE IN US NOT just us knowing who He is!!!!)

In order to gain Him in us, we MUST let go of all of those things I have made mention of. We cannot cling to anything else. We cannot cling to our understandings, our ideas, our doctrines, our teachings, our ministries, our abilities, our giftings, our friends, our families, our degrees, our training, OUR RIGHTS, our knowledge, our ANYTHING and EVERYTHING. As long as we cling to these things, WE are doing it, we are trying, we are striving, we are relying on ourselves to maintain our life. This includes relying on these “great” teachers of old, people like Finney, Wesley, Tozer, Lake, etc. Please do NOT think I am saying we should NOT read these wonderful things that were written by them, far from it; if you have paid attention you will see I refer to Tozer above. I speak of relying on them for TRUTH! They may agree with HIS Truth and that is well; we should recognize His truth whever we see it, YET we need to RELY SOLELY on Him, NOT some man, some teaching, anything except the Lord of Glory. These things do not have life in them.

Only Jesus has life in Him. We cannot cling to Him in the manner He COMMANDS unless we TRULY let go of all of these things and EVERYTHING ELSE I may have failed to mention. Only clinging to Jesus TOTALLY, SUPREMELY, in TOTAL ABANDON, in TOTAL SURRENDER, leaving nothing for ourselves, nothing for anyone else will ever provide the kind of life that Jesus lived on this earth for us. This is the kind of life that Peter, James, John, and Paul all lived. This is what is missing today because so many are afraid of losing what they THINK they have. People, even here, argue over who we should agree with, which teacher is correct. Friends, cease the struggle over who is right, THERE IS ONLY ONE who is Right; Only ONE who is TRUE!

It is ONLY in losing the life we think we have that we will gain the life He has promised. As long as we cling to the life we think we have, we WILL end up losing the life He has promised. Oh we MAY end up with Him in eternity; that is not my place to say one way or another. But we will NEVER have nor ENJOY the kind of life that HE promised to those who would abandon everything for Himself.

A bondslave in Christ Jesus, Dirk