Letting Go Of A Good Thing

Have you ever been in a situation where you feel like you should or need to break up with your partner, but you don’t want to? There is so much to say about the situation where you don’t want to let go of your relationship either because you’re scared of the future without them, you feel too dependent on them, you don’t want to make the wrong decision, or you simply love them and don’t want to let go.

Think about other times where you felt like the Lord wanted you to give something up to Him and your flesh was kicking and screaming, but you did it to honor Him and love Him above everything else.

It can be much more difficult giving Him someone that you love, over something. I understand what it’s like to see the red flags, yet you feel like love overpowers it, and so you stay. In my personal experience, my ex would tell me how much peace he had about our relationship, and sometimes that can bring confusion; like maybe I’m hearing God wrong or I’m overthinking. Other times, they treat you so well and you’re so in love, thinking they are the one for you, just for God to ask you to break up with them or for you to stop feeling peace about them.

In the grand scheme of things, when I was battling breaking up with my boyfriend or not, and I was questioning a lot, all of it came down to one question: Do I really trust God with every area of my life? I don’t mean the kind where you say you trust Him, but then you are up all night anxiously tossing and turning. I mean, to my core, if I am overthinking, if I'm anxious, if I’m really struggling, then have I fully surrendered my life, my heart, my thoughts, my feelings, and my decision making to Him? Probably not.

I was realizing that I either wasn’t trusting God to deal with the damage after breaking up with him, and that He wouldn't provide for me after the breakup or that I didn't trust that God would steer me in the right direction. “What if God doesn’t have something better for me? What if I make the wrong decision and I lose this guy for good?”

Sometimes we think this way because of immaturity, or lack of experience, or because of fear, but I believe the root of the questioning sometimes comes down to trust.

How do you know you can trust God when you feel like He wants you to walk away from a relationship that seems right, or that you felt peace about and suddenly you don’t? How do you walk away when your partner is treating you well and you’re happy with them?

The truth is, sometimes what God asks does not make sense or our rose colored glasses get in the way. But God’s ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts. Obedience doesn’t need to begin with it making sense to you, it just needs to begin with faith and trust.

Let’s go to the creation story of Genesis. Genesis 1:2-4 says, “The earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering the waters. and God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness.” He added beauty to something that was dark, and not beautiful.

Then Genesis 1:9-10 says, “...let dry ground appear.” And it was so. God called the dry ground land…and saw that it was good.” But on this dry land, He said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it” (Genesis 1:11-12). Now we see that He took what was dry and dead, something that was not bearing fruit (like a lot of relationships that people are in), and He brought life, growth, and beauty into it. He made it fruitful.

Also, side note if you noticed, darkness was already existing and God created the morning to precede the darkness of the evening. You know the verse, “Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning?” He proved it in creation.

THEN, God created us out of something that was meaningless, something that He stomped on, the lowest of anything, which was dust, and used the beauty, glory, and power of His breath, and formed the intricacy of human beings that would be able to carry His presence, that He could come dwell in, and that could be representatives of His beloved Son, Jesus.

When you grasp how the Lord works, and what His character really is like, it changes your entire mindset. How do you know you can trust God? You get to know His character, by reading His Word, which tells even in His creation, that He is a God who separates light and life from dark and dead things for a purpose; and He says that it is good every time He finishes something.

Even when you think something is good, like the dry land, He makes it better, and when you lose something, He makes the loss worth it. It’s simply how He works. He loves to make things beautiful. He is the definition of beauty. The only reason any type of relationship looks beautiful, is not because of the relationship itself, it’s because of Jesus’ love and His beauty exuding from the relationship.

When you’re dating someone and the Lord seems to be separating you from one another, there is so much intentionality behind that. He’s trying to create light from darkness, and give you something fruitful from a dry land.

Sometimes what looks good to us is just dry land with potential, but God says it has no vegetation. He knows how much more beautiful you can become and how much beauty He can create in another relationship, and sometimes He needs to separate the two in order to create life and light.

Deeply trusting God looks telling yourself that you don’t know what the future looks like and you don’t know why God wants this separation, but reminding yourself that He knows why. It looks like leading with obedience and faith, even though you can’t see the “why.”

Also, just a friendly reminder: It’s not your job to figure out the next step. It’s not your job to convince your partner to agree with you in your decision. It’s not your job to worry about when your heart will be okay, or when you’ll meet the right person. It is also not your job to worry about protecting their heart and giving them peace; that is God’s job and He cares just as much about their heart, as He cares about yours!

I feel like we don’t fully grasp how much it pleases God to give Him something even when we don’t want to, just because He asked; just because we love HIm. He is so worthy. His love out gives and out loves more than any other, and that’s how I know you would be just fine if you broke up with your partner. This is my way of hyping you up! Life is so much sweeter when we trust Him, live by faith and obedience, and lead with love. It is okay to hold on until you feel ready. It is okay to not want to let go. It is okay for it to be difficult. But trust Him.

Check out the video version below!