There is nothing that I hold on to

Oh, but there is.

truly free.

Lately the song, "Nothing I Hold On To" has been a re-occuring theme in my prayer life. Its so simple yet very profound. For those of you who either despise or can only take so much praise and worship, its probably one of those songs you imagine a bunch of charismatic folks singing seventy times seven times over. Yeah, like "Let It Rain" it can be over done but I find this song to be so powerful.

"I lean not on my own understand, my life is in the hands of the maker of Heaven"
Now ain't that the truth. There have been very few times in my life when I can honestly say I knew exactly why my life was going the way it was. We really never know exactly the magnificence of God's hand in our lives. We can never truly grasp his infinite Mercy and Love. So often in our lives we get wrapped up in whats going on, the possibilities, our fears, our passions that we forget that our lives are in the hands of the maker of Heaven, of our creator.
Now folks, I am a perfectionist through and through. If I'm not perfect, I'm not good enough. You know what they call that? Pride. But because I have a tendency to be a perfectionist I often find myself overwhelmed by even the simplest tasks in my life. I get overwhelmed in my relationships, in my spiritual life, in my school work, in my work, pretty much everything gets effected by it. I fabricate some master plan, that often contradicts itself or changes every ten seconds, to control my shortcomings. Its funny to God when I do this because I don't actually understand. I don't have a master plan to fix my shortcomings, which at times aren't even faults. When I sing this song I am reminded I have no clue what God's gonna do in my life. All I know is that he made me out of love and loves me infinitely and if I stop trying to perfect what doesn't need perfecting than I can allow him to guide me and form me. I cannot lean on my own understanding, I have to surrender my life to the hands of the maker of Heaven.

"I give it all to you, God, trusting that you'll make something beautiful out of me"
This is one of my favorite lines of this song. I give everything to you God. But do I really? Do I allow him to have every part of me? And do I trust that he's making something beautiful out of me? out of the work or things I do? out of my life? Just thinking now, I can recall a few specific times in prayer where I have just cried out my desires and anxieties to God and I feel him simply tell me, "Do you not trust that I love you and I want to give you the best?" We cannot rely on our own understanding, we have to give it all to God and TRUST that we is making something beautiful out of us. If we do not believe that God is going to grant us our desires than why do we even ask? The desires we have on our hearts are from the Lord and he wants us to ask him. He wants to satisfy our desires and all we have to do is ask and expect - truly trust that he will answer our prayers. We have to give it all to him and trust that we will make something beautiful out of us.
This line speaks to me in a different way as well; in our daily life we can get anxious about the things that fill our day. I can try and be too "perfect" but God does not want us to be anxious, he does not give us anxiety but rather peace and so we must give it all to him and truly trust that he is making something beautiful out of us.

"I will climb this mountain with my hands wide open"
Have you ever been hiking? Up a really steep, steep mountain? I had the privilege of being surrounded by beautiful mountains while I was in Austria and hiked them. One day a couple of my friends and I decided to take the short cut down the mountain and we literally fell down it because it was so incredibly steep. Now I can't imagine hiking up that mountain without using my arms for balance or maybe even holding on to the nature surrounding me. As this song popped into my head the other day I imagined myself literally climbing a mountain with my arms stretched out, open wide. I imagined I couldn't help but stumble a little and lose my balance. I had to rely on my arms to help me balance myself as I climbed the mountain and the further up I went and the harder it became. Sounds an awful lot like what this song is asking. To truly surrender to God we have to let go of the comfortable and yes, we will fall, and yes, it will be frustrating and difficult and harder the higher we climb but we have to trust God to hold on to us and we have to let go of all control. Into his hands we must commend ourselves and climb this mountain with our hands wide open.

"Theres nothing I hold on to" 
Ironically these all tie together... lets go back to the me falling down an entire Austrian mountain scene again. There were times I held onto the trees to help me from falling but there came a point where there was nothing left except a bunch of tall grass which had no traction what so ever. I basically scooted my boot down the rest of the mountain; I literally had nothing to hold on to. This line brings me back to my perfectionism; my ideas and plans and control isn't going be enough for me to hold onto. It will pass me by and all I'll have is weak grass and I will no loner have anything to hold on to. I will need to free fall into the arms of Love, God. But if I was afraid of falling, of losing control, I would have stayed at the tree and clung to it but I wouldn't have ever come home. To stretch the analogy a bit further - it was dinner time when we finished our hike that one day in Austria so I would have grown incredibly hungry clinging to that not-so-tasty tree. If we stay stuck in the control of our lives afraid to allow the Lord to lead us we will get nowhere and we will hunger for Him with a very strong and deep hunger. If we hold onto nothing we completely abandon all that we cling to for "safety" and comfort and are able to totally surrendering to God.

Simple song? Yes. But oh so beautiful.

I hope these simple thoughts and meditations lead you a little deeper to our Lord. Praise Him.


I'm going to say in the context of this post my food for thought will be my first picture - "born to be free"