Surrender All

“This day, for the sake of God’s people, I make a new consecration of my all to Jesus Christ. I now and forever give myself to Him, my soul to be washed in His blood and saved in heaven at last, my whole body to be used for His glory, my mouth to speak for Him at all times, my eyes to weep over lost sinners, my feet to carry me where He wants me to go, my heart to be burdened for souls, my intellect to be employed at all times for His glory. I give Him my wife, my children, my property. All I have and all I ever shall be, I give to Him that I may obey every known duty for the sake of my Savior and His message.”

—A.B. Earle (1812-1895)

This is the kind of man I want to be, and that means walking step by step with God in constant, and intentional fellowship through His Spirit and the enabling of the blood of Christ. That life is worth fighting for. For the Christian, this surrender is to be most desired, declaring all we have, all we have had, or all we ever will have, as not ours—never was, nor ever will be.

We’ve been bought with a price, and it’s time to start living like we belong to God.

So what does that mean for your life? How will you, today, start living in complete surrender to your King? How will you live to for the desires of His will instead your own? What changes must take place?

Consider the words of Jesus:

“Take up your cross…”

“My yoke is easy, and my burden light…”

This sacrifice is going to be harder and yet easier. However, one thing we can be sure of: It will be full of joy…real, deep, lasting, there-in-spite-of-horrible-circumstances… you name it.  Christian joy is based on truth, not circumstance. It is everlasting. It is ever-powerful. It is joy.

Jesus doesn’t promise us a comfortable life, nor does he call for it. He does, however, call us to a life that counts for something. It’s a life that shines not so people might see us, but rather, that by our lives they might come to know God, glorifying Him with the same response of surrender (Matthew 5:14-16).

“And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says ‘I know him’ but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.” (1 John 2:3-6)

So what is our standard? Rather, who is our standard? It is Christ Jesus, the Messiah.

C.S. Lewis writes:

“The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says, ‘Give me ALL. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want you. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked–the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.”

There are three different responses we can have to this call to such radical and complete surrender, and it is just that. If you ever find yourself thinking that Christian surrender doesn’t necessarily have to be radical or complete, go read the sermon on the mount in Matthew 5-7. Then, try to walk away from the text feeling like you’re living up to the demands of Christ. You won’t.

Three responses to radical and complete surrender

The first response: The go-getters

We can get crazy motivated and walk away from reading this and decide: “I’m going to do this! I’m going to surrender all to God! I got this!” This will result in a depressing realization that you cannot do it on your own.

The second response: The sit-and-hopes

We can get crazy convicted and realize we could never really live up to the demands of Christ, but we know that God’s grace covers us so we hope that God will change us, somehow (fingers crossed).

The third response: The empowered

We walk away from reading this knowing that God’s grace is not opposed to our efforts towards holiness; rather, our efforts are actually gifts from God. Through this realization, we can echo the proclamation of the apostle Paul: I can do all things through Christ Jesus who strengthens me! We must start with the realization that we are poor (Matthew 5:3), and thereby we are moved to hunger and thirst for righteousness, like the poor beggars we are—and Christ will fill us (Matthew 5:6).

It is His work, not ours.

Let’s respond this third way.

God, help us all. Enlarge our hearts according to your loving-kindness.

Amen.