What Are You Still Hanging On To

What are you hanging onto “just in case” something goes wrong?

It’s like keeping a candy bar in your purse. Just in case. The moment you and I start hiding something, something’s wrong. If you have nothing to hide, you hide nothing.

Jacob had a life-changing encounter when he wrestled with God. Got a new name. Israel. New identity. New future. But Scripture still calls him “Jacob” here. He wasn’t living his new identity. God was moving him forward, but old crap was still in his life. God called him to Bethel, a new way of living. That’s when the hidden inventory came to light.

“So Jacob said to his family and to all who were with him, ‘Put away the foreign gods you have, and make yourselves clean, and change your clothes’” (Genesis 35:2, NCV).

Wait. Foreign gods? Still?

“So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods they had, and the earrings they were wearing, and he buried them under the great tree near the town of Shechem” (Genesis 35:4, NCV).

Buried. Not stored for later. Buried permanently where digging them back up would cost something.

Jacob wrestled God alone. His family didn’t.

They just lived with someone who did. His breakthrough didn’t transfer to them. His transformation didn’t clean out their closets. You can be renamed by God and still lead a compromised household.

We all do this. We say we love Jesus yet hang onto something.

That contact you should delete. Money you grip like oxygen. Your job that’s become your identity. Your addiction renamed a habit. Your need for approval controlling every decision.

Why do we hang onto things that make us weak? We keep backup plans because somewhere inside we’re not sure God will come through.

Here’s the thing about Jesus. He didn’t keep backup plans. When He went to the cross, He went all in. No escape route. No Plan B. “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8, NCV).

Jesus didn’t die hoping you’d get your act together. He died knowing you were broken. Knowing you’d fail. Knowing you’d hide idols and call them harmless. He lived the perfect life God requires because you and I weren’t willing to. He did it specifically for us. He obeyed when we wouldn’t. He trusted when we couldn’t.

Then He died to bury our sin permanently. Not manage it better. He dealt with it decisively, once for all.

God keeps pursuing even when we’re holding onto junk.

Bethel was where Jacob first met God decades earlier. God didn’t call him somewhere new. He called him back to where the promises were first made. Back to where it started before life got complicated and idols accumulated. Sometimes the way forward is to return where you started.

I’ve say it all the time. I wrote a book about it. It’s my personal mantra. Draw another line. Write “start” and try to finish well. You will screw up like Jacob. When you do, draw another line. When you’re older, you’ll look back and see all those lines. You still won’t be where you desire, but you won’t be where you were.

“Come back to me with all your heart” (Joel 2:12, NCV). Not part of your heart. All of it.

You don’t have to do something terrible to erode, stifle growth, or die physically, emotionally, or spiritually.

All you have to do is nothing. Nothing produces nothing.

You don’t fall backward by making mistakes. You fall backward by making no moves at all. By tolerating what you should bury. By keeping what you should release. Change comes from doing something, even if it’s small.

That uneasy feeling you have? That’s God pursuing you. That’s the Holy Spirit making you uncomfortable with comfort that’s killing you.

Just give in to the One who sent you Christ. Through Christ, we’re redeemed. Our sins are forgiven. Past tense. Done deal. So live like it if you’ve claimed Jesus as Lord and Savior.

“If you love me, you will obey my commands” (John 14:15, NCV).

Not as a condition for love. As a response to it. “God began doing a good work in you, and I am sure he will continue it until it is finished when Jesus Christ comes again” (Philippians 1:6, NCV). God starts something in us with Christ. Now He wants to finish it. But He won’t finish what you won’t release.

Here’s what this looks like.

Sit down today. Ask God to show you what you’re trusting instead of Him. Write it down. Be brutally honest. Don’t sanitize it. Call it what it is. Then decide what burying it looks like. Not managing it better. Burying it.

If it’s money, set up automatic giving that scares you a little. Not comfortable generosity. Sacrificial generosity that makes you wonder if God will come through.

If it’s control, let someone else make the decision. Stop micromanaging. If it’s a relationship that dishonors God, end it today. Not next week. Today.

If it’s approval, stop checking that feed. Delete the app. Make accessing it painful enough that you’re forced to find worth somewhere else.

“Throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us” (Hebrews 12:1, NCV).

You can’t run carrying competitors. You have to bury them to be free. What’s that small thing you could bury that would create large change in your life? Maybe it’s not dramatic. Maybe it’s just one contact. One app. One habit. One fear you’ve been feeding.

Jacob buried those idols under a tree. Made it hard to dig them back up. Made the cost of returning to them high enough that he was forced to trust God instead. That’s the move. Not gradual improvement. Permanent burial.

“You cannot serve two masters. The person will hate one master and love the other, or will follow one master and refuse to follow the other” (Matthew 6:24, NCV).

Jesus doesn’t share the throne. Your idols aren’t worth sharing your life with either. They promise security and deliver slavery. So bury them. Today. Now. Make it permanent.

Do you really want freedom, growth, and peace? Or do you just want to feel better about staying stuck?

Because God doesn’t want your leftovers. He wants all of you. Not because He’s insecure. Because divided hearts produce miserable lives.

Lord, help us confess our stuff. You already know about it. Now we just need to deal with it. Help us lock down, throw away, and permanently bury what keeps haunting us. I confess it now. I will bury it once and for all. Holy Spirit, help me follow through. Give me courage to make it permanent. Give me strength to trust You when I’m tempted to dig up what I’ve buried. IJNIP amen ♥️