Letting Go

As I mentioned this morning, the service this morning at conference was wonderful. The sermon was delivered by Brenda Shreve, and it was entitled Let Go and Let God. The text upon which the service was based was Micah 6:6-8.

And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. (Verse 8b)

Notice that the verse does not call upon us to seek retribution. She spoke about letting go of whatever is keeping us from living humbly -- to live in obedience to God. One of my favorite lines from the sermon --> If God controls you on the inside, you will be genuine on the outside. She asked us to write on a card what we needed to release and to come to the altar and drop it in clay jars placed there.

Without going into major details, on my card I wrote the name of a person with whom I have a rather strained relationship. A few things struck me about this "letting go."

1. I have a poor relationship with this person for several reasons, but some of them are things which he does that I cannot control. I can't imagine that I will suddenly become OK with his behavior. What I decided is that I will endeavor to pray for this person -- not that God would change his heart or his actions to please me, but I will try to pray FOR him.
2. It was very emotional service. Obviously, there were people who were giving up very deep problems -- much more deep rooted and troublesome than my own. After I returned to my seat, and picked up my bulletin to begin singing as the "letting go" continued, I saw that the song was Spirit Song. I was certain that I would not make it throught that song without tears. I was just about to decide to not sing it, when I looked at the altar rail and watched all of the men and women praying and dropping cards into the containers provided. It occured to me that I should sing for them -- that they needed the song to be sung by the congregation for them as they prayed. So I did, and I made it through the entire thing. I wonder if that is one of the blessings of releasing problems like this -- it takes the focus off of ourselves. God is able to point out to us opportunties we have to be a blessing to someone else -- opportunities that we would miss if we are only looking at ourselves.
3. We ended with a prayer which included a request to God for the ability to trust in him. I haven't done that in this situation. I haven't trusted in God. Surrendering it to God means trusting him to take care of it.

So I will pray, and I will look outside myself, and I will trust God. He is trustworthy.

Images: Sundial window in the West Chapel of the Wesley Chapel building. A couple of days ago, I posted a picture of the windows from the outside - this once is from the inside during the day. The second image is the altar for this morning's service. The ppt slides of leaves is part of the Prelude -- music played to nature scenes with a paraphrase of Psalm 23. It was wonderful.