Jesus First: Seven Practices to Put Your Life Back in Orderნიმუში

Day 5: The Practice of Letting Go

Let’s get philosophical and talk about “gains” and “losses” in life. Not in a financial sense, but in the deep, soul-defining sense of what we count as valuable. “Gains” and “losses”, you see, are not fixed ideas. They shift as our seasons change, our faith matures, and our priorities evolve. What felt like a gain in one chapter of your life might look like a loss in another.

Think of it like this: imagine being offered more hours at work. If you're in financial need, it's a gain. But if you’re already burnt out and your family is longing for time with you, it's a loss. Same event, different perspective.

Jesus Himself explores this dynamic. In Matthew 16:26 NIV, He issues one of His most confronting challenges: “What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?” It’s an unsettling question: one that brings our own definitions of “gains” and “losses” into sharp focus. What are we chasing? What are we calling “gain” that may, in fact, be costing us everything?

Paul picks up the same accounting imagery in today’s passage. He lists his impressive résumé – his status, achievements, and religious pedigree – and declares them loss, even garbage, compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ. His whole value system has been flipped, his profit and loss columns upended. Why? Because the things that once built his identity now distract from the only identity that truly matters: being found in Jesus.

Letting go, then, isn’t just a poetic metaphor – it’s a daily discipleship practice. You can’t put Jesus first without putting other things second. And sometimes, that even means releasing ‘good’ things that have become ‘ultimate’ things – or idols.

So how do we practise letting go?

We pause and ask: What am I clinging to for security, identity, or validation? Is it leading me closer to Jesus, or quietly replacing Him?

Then, with humility and courage, we open our hands. We ask the Holy Spirit to reorder our desires. We delete the app, end the toxic pursuit, and say the hard no. We trade counterfeit gains for eternal ones. For, as Augustine once prayed: “He who has God has everything; he who has everything but God has nothing.”

Practice Prompt: Take an honest inventory of your week. What have you spent your energy pursuing? What has been consuming your headspace? Now ask: Are these things helping me know Jesus more or less? Choose one thing to release today, in order to make more space for Him.

Prayer: Jesus, I make the same declaration before you today as Paul did all those years ago: “whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for your sake”. Help me to reorder my life so that you are first, in everything. Amen.