Open Hands

There are things God gives us that we can grasp tightly. In fact I believe that every promise is meant to be taken for fact and held with a vice grip. The more we are challenged, the tighter our grasp should be. Conflict should make us close our fists on the promises of God and hold on for dear life.
There are other things God gives to us that are meant to be help with open hands. Usually these things are specific blessings or hopes. When we lift our hands to God he pours His torrential deluge of blessing out on us. We hold our hands up and they are filled.
The problem comes when we claim these blessings as our rights. We try to catch the flood of  gifts but, like water, as we grasp for them we find our hands are empty.
God delights in giving His children good gifts but when we claim the gift as our own by our own right, and not as a gift of God (which by definition is something we don't deserve), it usually is not long before He shows us that He can indeed give and take away. And not only that, but many of the gifts we are given, by their very nature slip through our fingers the tighter we try to hold on to them.
The gifts of God have some very unique qualities. Specifically they are unique in their ownership. By that I mean this: When God gives us is gift it is completely ours, not because we earned it, but simply because God says that it is ours. However many of these gifts, or specifically the blessings, are only ours so long as we accept them as gifts and we don't believe they are our rights. In point of fact, we deserve none of the gifts that are so freely giving to us. The things we do deserve look much different than the things we receive.
As an example think of a friendship or any relationship. When we accept it as a gift of God and hold it with an open hand it goes smoothly, just because of the laws on human nature God has established. When we begin to close our fist on a relationship we find the other person slipping away. That rule seems to apply pretty universally. The more controlling we try to be, the less control or influence we have.
Another example is grace. By definition grace is God unmerited favor toward humans. We don't deserve it. And when we recognize that and live in the light of the gift we have been given we live in grace. However when we forget that grace is only ours because it was given to us we lose the ability to live in that grace which is critical for victorious living.
This is a special showcase of the perfect love of God. If we could earn blessings we would become self righteous. And when we lose control we have more freedom than when we try to control everything. God's perfect design requires dependence on Him, in the same way that a child is dependent on its father. More accurately, a child's dependence on it's father is a picture of every humans dependence on God.
So I'm trying to live with open hands.