Whose Life Is It?

SCRIPTURE: Matt. 16:25 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it.

OBSERVATION: If we try to control all the details of our lives, if we measure our lives by the pile of stuff it produces, if we force it to conform to our view of success (as this world views it), if we try to manipulate others to love us and serve us then life will slip thorough our hands like so much sand.

Conversely, if we give up and submit to what God is up to in us and in partnership with us, then we will have a life that makes sense, that works, that has value. One that we can look back on at the end of and truly feel that our short years on this planet were well spent. This is what we saw Joseph doing and it brought him real life--in fact, rulership over all of Egypt.

APPLICATION/CONFESSION: I operate so often in fear. What will happen if I don't hold on tight to my life? What will I lose? I am learning that the losing comes from this kind of holding on. The salvation, my true life from from letting go.

PRAYER: Lord, wrench my hands free from my own life. You gave it to me twice--when I was born and when I came to accept you. You own me and I want to submit my life back to you.