Assuming you read my last post, yes, this is one more spurred by my favorite movie to date. In case you haven’t gathered, I think a lot. Therefore, my turning on a movie deep as Fight Club, I should expect nothing less than to at least attempt to think into it. Any hopes of a casual viewing were dashed when Brad Pitt’s character, Tyler Durden, utters this line:

“It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to gain anything.”

Despite the glaring lack of sleep, my mind was racing. What do I hold onto too tightly? What am I not willing to lose? What is holding me back in life?

I was not ready for the answer, but it came back to me a booming voice in my heart. “More than you care to know right now,” and I believe it. The better question to ask is what do I not hold onto like a kid on a merry-go-round spinning out of control? I hold onto friendships, love, money and happiness like they’re going out of style.

Each friendship is like a mirage in the desert and I am fighting to not let the sight vaporize back into the haze. Every romantic relationship is my last chance at getting it “right”. Money is something I may never see again if I don’t hold onto it long enough. Happiness is like my opiate for the inevitable pain of life. All of them I strangle until they each in turn slip away.

Tyler Durden’s words are not unlike another quote from nearly two millennia before. “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” sounds eerily similar in my mind (Matthew 16:25). Yes, these are the words of Jesus, but for some reason Tyler’s words ring out louder. For some reason, my heart does not want to hear the Son of God’s call to cast aside the trifling aspects of this existence. No, but Tyler’s words are profound.

Regardless, this is a huge problem in my life. I’m no Midas, therefore everything I seem to touch in this life just seems to break or turn to dust rather than gold. I’m not self-deprecating, I’m being honest. I micro-manage my possessions and relationships and ruin them all beyond recognition. It is merely fact that I need to stop and let go.

Jesus’ words don’t make sense to me, because deep within, I want to make this life as comfortable, pleasant and long as possible. However, He assures me that in so doing, I will only accomplish the opposite. Despite the tendencies of my heart, I have seen these words in action in my daily life. They prove my broken heart wrong time and again. How long will I go on daftly trying to prove the One through whom all things were created?

How long will we continue to hold with a death grip that which we never had in the first place? How long will we continue to occupy ourselves with only the worthless things that fit into our feeble and clumsy hands? When will we let go and just lose ourselves? When will we begin to allow God to give us the invaluable things we could never hope to hold onto by ourselves, let alone attain in the first place? It’s already been far too long, friend.