One year passed and things in my little world began to fall apart. Through a long string of circumstances I found myself facing a tragedy. Looking back I can see clearly that God was prying my fingers off that “thing” one by one. But when he got down to the thumb, I fought back. I didn’t want to give it up. But God is stronger than any man and eventually he pulled my thumb off. As the wise man said, your arms are too short to box with God. I gave my idol back to him, but when I gave it back, I saw clearly that it was no pagan idol, but something good that had become too important in my life. In the end God took back that which had always belonged to him in the first place.

One Sunday afternoon during this personal crisis I took a long walk and began to meditate on 1 Peter 4:19 (NIV), “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good." The little phrase “according to God’s will” caught my attention. I realized that it had been many years since I had been concerned about doing God’s will. Once that had been a consuming passion; now I hardly ever thought about it.

And I remembered my friend’s admonition: “Ray, you need to let go.” As I walked, I held out an open palm and began to let go. Little by little, I released the things in my life that I had been holding onto so tightly. As I did, I felt an enormous sense of relief, as if God were saying, “It’s about time.”

God orchestrates the affairs of life — both the good and the bad — to bring us to the place where our faith will be in him alone. Slowly but surely as we go through life, he weans us away from the things of the world. At first the process touches only our possessions (which we can replace), but eventually it touches our relationships (which may not be replaced), then it touches our loved ones (who cannot be replaced), finally it touches life itself (which is never replaced). Then there is nothing left but us and God.

Through all this process our Heavenly Father leads us along the pathway of complete trust in him. Slowly but surely we discover that the things we thought we couldn’t live without don’t matter as much as we thought they did. Even the dearest and sweetest things of life take second place to the pleasure of knowing God. In the end we discover that he has emptied our hands of everything and then filled them with himself.
 
Hold Lightly What God Has Given You

In writing these words I am aware that I only dimly understand their full meaning. At this point in my life I still have many things in my hands — my wife, my three boys, a wonderful daughter-in-law and another one coming soon, my friends, my career, my health, my dreams, my plans for the future. But the process of growing older is nothing more than this — learning to hold lightly the things God has given you, knowing that you can’t keep them forever anyway. At any moment, he can take them away — one by one, two at a time, or all of them together. Or he could take back the life he gave me 54 years ago.

If I have any advice for you, it is this. Learn to hold lightly what God has given you. You can’t keep it forever and you can’t take it with you.

Some of you who read these words are in the midst of a great struggle in your life. You feel pressured about something and you don’t want to give it up. But you must... and you will. I can’t spare you the pain of yielding your dearest treasures to God, but I promise you the joy will far outweigh the pain you feel right now.

We call the story Jesus told the parable of the rich fool. But he wasn't a fool because he was rich. He was a fool because he tried to hold on to what was never his in the first place.

Don't be a fool!
Let go of the things you own.

Hold lightly what you value greatly.
It all belongs to God anyway.