Let It Go

“If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.” (Matthew 10:39 NLT)

I promise you this talk was not inspired by the movie “Frozen”, even though I still catch myself humming to the song… Do you wanna build a snowman… (my three girls were little when the movie came out!)

Success is something we value a lot in western culture. We place high value on achieving, on pushing forward and climbing higher and grasping at what we perceive as success. We might say this comes from a “spirit of conquest” or our “competitive natures.” In the U.S. we claim the “American Dream.” Sometimes even in the Church, we can confuse this idea of success for something holy. And while there is truly no problem with a pure entrepreneurial spirit (the Bible is full of godly people who were like that), there is ONE big problem with the way we dream up, go after, or simply measure our success: Our understanding of success is at odds with how God defines success. God’s Kingdom flips our values on their heads. You see, this might come as a surprise to you, but the Western way isn’t necessarily the Kingdom Way.

Jesus put it this way to his bewildered followers, “If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.” (Matthew 10:39 NLT)

Talk about an upside-down way of seeing things! Or maybe not so much.

The Bible is filled with stories of people who wanted to live by their own definition of success. Here are some examples:

- Adam/Eve: Adam and Eve thought they were somehow missing out by not eating from a certain tree. They ate from the tree at the expense of a perfect relationship with their creator!

- Jacob: Otherwise known as “deceiver”, Jacob tried to find success all of his life by his own means. Finally his ways caught up with him. It wasn’t until he finally quit trying, and put his situation in God’s hands (by force!), that he finally discovered true success.

- Peter: Peter thought success was going out to battle and winning by force. At one point he cuts off the ear of a soldier. Jesus, by contrast, defined success as dying. At the end of three days, Peter was the beat down remorseful soul, while Jesus was raised from the dead!

There isn’t anything wrong with succeeding, unless our pathway toward success takes us away from the life God intended for us to live for Him. While we focus on forming and chasing a big dream, God ultimately calls us to lay our dreams on an altar and pursue Jesus and His Kingdom instead. Sometimes, pursuing Christ instead of personal success actually leads to our old idea of success as God places us in positions of influence for God’s glory’s sake. Except when that happens, we tend to not care anymore about our positions, our own glory, or our comfort.

If you’re living for the next promotion, the bigger house, the higher position, the image you have in your mind of what “success” looks like, you may miss the very best pursuit of all – the pursuit of knowing your Creator intimately. But if you loosen your grip on your life and surrender to God’s will and desires for you, your relationship with God will become far more fulfilling than any position you could ever occupy.

The way to find your life is to lose it, to let it go. What kind of success are you aiming for?

Submitted by World Methodist Evangelism

“Share Our Food With The Hungry” (Isaiah 58) Weekend Prayer and Action Against Hunger on 14-16 October 2023

Since several years we partner with many other Christian communions and organizations to raise awareness for spiritual and practical steps to overcome hunger. Hunger is avoidable, there is plenty of food for all. Yet because of human failure, climate change, armed conflicts, exploitation of mother earth and unsustainable food production for the benefit of global companies instead of ordinary people, as many as 783 million people faced hunger worldwide in 2022.

I worked with a team of Ecumenical leaders to provide material for local churches, house groups and families to engage in prayer and action against hunger around World Food Day (October 16). We recommend the liturgy available soon in various languages at https://www.wvi.org/emergencies/hunger-crisis/weekend-of-prayer to be shared with those who do worship planning. In addition, you are also encouraged to reflect on the Ten Commandments of Food https://www.oikoumene.org/sites/default/files/Document/TenCommandmentsFood. pdf, to which we add a child friendly version.

Several of our member churches and affiliated organizations engage in programs to overcome hunger. Consider supporting these initiatives locally and globally. The biblical reference for this year’s Prayer and Action Against Hunger campaign is Isaiah 58:6-12: “to loose the chains of injustice, untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free...and share our food with the hungry… Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.” Let it be so!