Sunday, June 14, 2026 | Into the Wilderness, Week 3

Where Are We Headed This Week?

Letting go is the thing we’re worst at. We hold on — to control, to being right, to the way we thought our life would go, to the version of ourselves we’ve worked so hard to build. And we hold on because somewhere along the way we got convinced that holding on is what keeps us safe. Let go and you’ll fall. Surrender and you’ve lost.

This week the wilderness asks for your grip. And it makes a claim that runs against everything in us: surrender is not defeat. It’s freedom. The white-knuckle life you’ve been living — managing everything, protecting everything, proving everything — was never strength. It was exhaustion dressed up as strength. And the desert is where God finally gets your hands open.

That’s where we’re headed. Four texts, one hard and freeing point: you cannot receive a new name while you’re still clinging to the old one.

A Deeper Look

The false self has a creed, and most of us have recited it without realizing: I am what I achieve, what I control, and what I protect. So we achieve, and control, and protect, and we call it living. But it’s really just gripping. And the wilderness is where God pries the fingers loose — not to take from you, but because your hands are too full to receive anything new.

Watch three people let go this week. Jacob wrestles God all night and refuses to quit until he gets a blessing, and God dislocates his hip — he walks away with a new name and a permanent limp, finally a man who can’t rely on his own strength. The psalmist describes a soul that has stopped striving, quiet as a weaned child who no longer screams for what it wants. Paul looks at his entire impressive résumé — the pedigree, the achievements, the religious credentials — and calls it garbage compared to knowing Christ. And Jesus, in a garden, with everything in him recoiling, prays the seven words the whole series has been building toward: not my will, but yours.

None of these is a story of giving up. Every one is a story of getting free. Jacob limps, but he’s blessed. The psalmist is quiet, but he’s at rest. Paul loses the résumé, but he gains Christ. Jesus surrenders his will, and through it saves the world. Letting go felt like dying to each of them. It turned out to be the door to life. The grip was never holding you together. It was holding you back.

Biblical Texts This Week

• Sunday: Genesis 32:22–30, Psalm 131, Philippians 3:7–10, Luke 22:39–46 — Letting Go
• Monday: Genesis 32:22–30 — Jacob limps away blessed, finally unable to rely on his own strength
• Tuesday: Psalm 131 — a soul as quiet as a weaned child that’s stopped striving
• Wednesday: Philippians 3:7–10 — Paul throws the whole résumé away to gain Christ
• Thursday: Luke 22:39–46 — “not my will, but yours” in the garden
• Friday: The thread named

Weekly Practices

1. Name your grip this week. Finish the sentence honestly: I am what I ______. Achieve? Control? Protect? Then name the specific thing your hands are clenched around right now — an outcome, a relationship, a version of how this was supposed to go. You can’t open a hand you won’t admit is closed.
2. Pray Jesus’ seven words slowly, once a day, about one real thing: not my will, but yours. Don’t pray it about everything at once — that’s too abstract to mean anything. Pick the one situation you’re gripping hardest and pray it there. Notice how hard it is to mean. That difficulty is the wilderness doing its work.