Let Go and Hold On

Confusing though this title be

Follow me and you will see

As we anticipate the coming dawn

How we can let go and still hold on.

For the night is swiftly passing by

With its terror and our fear

And doubt assaults our little faith

As the trials continually appear.

The grueling race is ours to win

But we grab ahold of the besetting sin

And though we long to let it go

We still hold on; the evidence shows.

Life storms are constantly upon us

And its tempest rages deep within,

We scarcely hear the Shepherd’s voice

With the distraction of the din.

Let go and hold on is the plea

That comes amidst contrary gusts

But there are things we treasure here

And so we guard them with much fuss.

Do you see where all this leads?

This theme is really not a paradox

Instead it is simply God’s admonition

That faith delivers us from the box.

“Forgetting those things which are behind,”

The Apostle to the Philippians reminds us

“I press toward the mark for the prize

Of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”

The concept is letting go of our past

And counting those things gained as loss

And holding on to the eternal Christ

Who for us endured the cross.

It is letting go of the allurements

The glitter and glamour of Satan’s deceit

And holding on to Christ our Saviour

Casting all our treasures at his feet.

It is trusting in him for our salvation

Whose shed blood cleanses from sin

It is holding on to the fact of his grace

And letting go all that detracts from him.

We must die in order to live

Is a paradox of seeming impossibility

But letting go in order to hold on

Is not such; I hope you can see.

Spiritual paradoxes are only possible

Because God is the God of impossibilities

But letting go so that we can hold on

Is the daily walk of the Christian journey.

It is a “casting off the works of darkness”

And a “putting on of the armour of light”,

It is putting off the conversation of the old man

And from the devil’s treats taking flight.

It is submitting ourselves to Almighty God

And resisting the devil so that he flees,

It is draw nigh to God who will draw nigh to us

In James 4 is this straightforward decree.

In the New Testament in Acts chapter 5

There is a false attempt to let go and hold on,

Ananias and Sapphira had tried it their way

But in the end everything they had was gone.

Even their very life they also lost

When their concocted story Peter refused,

They sold their possessions but kept a part

This was the path they decided to choose.

They tried to hold on without letting go

And the baggage weighed them down,

In trying to get man’s acclaim and God’s too

They lost the victor’s crown.

Holding on and letting go

Is a fact of the Christian’s life,

If we refuse to let go when God says to

The likelihood is disaster and strife.

To hold on with out letting go

Is impossible in the Christian’s walk,

It is pretending to be a follower of Christ

Yet there is no action but just talk.

To hold on without letting go

Is to straddle the fence as the saying goes,

To be candid it’s neither here nor there but

A pseudo friendship with very real foes.

A putting off and putting on, that’s the key,

A progressive walk, not a hyped up spree,

A commitment to the charge to walk holy,

Let go and hold on is the Spirit’s plea.

Stewart Russell © 2017