A yielded heart produces praise...

“No! I can’t let him go! I can’t move on. I love him too much.”

This was my heart’s cry last week. The Lord urged me to let my brother go by yielding him and accepting change. I resented the change with everything in me. If this is the way things were going to be, fine, but I was not moving on. I was not going to go on loving. My selfish heart told me that love hurt too much.

Saturday a friend confronted me about this and urged me to go living and loving so that God could use me to glorify His name. Sunday, pastor spoke on surrender. I knew the Lord was calling me to yield. During the message, I clenched my jaw and excused the conviction with, “Lord, I just can’t right now. Not yet. I love him too much.” After the message was complete, a father stood up and shared. He asked, “Do we love our family to the point that we fight God over them?” Conviction swelled within me. It hit me – this whole time, I had been breaking the 2nd commandment. I was telling God that I loved Chris more than I loved Him. Was my relationship with Chris more valuable to me than my relationship with God? If not, then why was I fighting with God over letting him go?

I yielded. I let him go. I committed to God that I would move on and be willing to live a different life. It was time to go on.

Two days after accepting the fact that Chris and my relationship would never be the same again, I got a call from my brother. We ended up talking (not chatting!) for over an hour. It was the first “real” talk that we had had since he left over a month ago. Is that not just like our Lord? As soon as we stop fighting for our rights, he sets the very thing we had been fighting for right in our lap. He is able; but he wants our heart first.

Satan appears as an angle of light. Before this past weekend, I was completely blinded to the fact that Chris was my “god.” My best friend had moved across the country. I was hurting. What was wrong with that? Satan used a “good” relationship to cause me to stumble. It is excellent to have a deep relationship with siblings. It only seems right to love them and miss the fellowship that you had with them. Sin comes in all shapes in sizes. Sometimes it’s just not as apparent as blaspheme and immorality. Yet, it is just as disgusting to our God. We need to watch and pray so that we do not enter into temptation. As the body of Christ, we need to be confronting each other in love when we see sin. I am thankful that my friend had courage to prod me on. I am thankful that my pastor had boldness to stand up and preach truth. I praise the Lord that a fellow believer stood and humbly confessed what the Lord had been teaching him. We need to expose sin for what it really is – darkness.

“I will give thanks for what has been and what’s to come.”