If I Let Go, He Can Fly
“He needs to fly.”
That’s what my prayer partner told me.
She had joined with me in praying for a loved one on a long, hard journey. The journey had been wild and dark for many years, but more recently had been slowly, perhaps arduously, moving in a better direction.
Then six months ago darkness returned. Relationships failed. Choices had consequences. Pain prevailed. Despair deepened.
Me? I cried. I encouraged, exhorted, lectured, begged.
Rescued.
Prayed.
And called on this prayer warrior. One day she wrote: “Judy, I was praying for him. But the Lord told me to pray for you. To pray for you to let go so God could catch him and make him fly.”
So I said, “Lord, he’s yours. I let go. I give him to you. I can’t make things happen the way I wish they would. I am helpless, inadequate, unable. So I entrust him to you. Yes, please catch him when I let go, and please, please may he fly. He and I are both so weary of this dusty, brambled road. May he fly.”
With all sincerity and strong intentions.But I seem to have bungee cords attached to my hands. As I let go, as I fling him onto the Lord, in almost no time my heart and my hands have pulled him back.
It’s always taken iterations for me to really get most truths. In this God has given me some words for him that are helping me to keep my hands open. Some are prayers. Some realities or promises. Some are hopes.
Forgiven/forgiving
Healed
Free to fail/to fly
Courageous
Unabandoned
Trusted/trusting
Hopeful
Adopted
Loved
Accepted
Desired
Believed in/for
Not a victim
So with these words of hope I turn to exhortation after exhortation in God’s Word to entrust him, along with my fears, to God:
“Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you….” (Psalm 55:22)
“Casting all your cares on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:7)“
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6.34)
What about you? What are you holding on to?
C2013 Judy Douglass