Surrendered To God's Will - Part #5

     Have you ever witnessed a two year old trying to wheel and deal with a parent?   You know, the time when he is holding the scissors and insists, "it is a good idea" that he uses them on his sister's hair.  How about the time when mom asks for the cookies back and the little girl happily offers one back, while the other is crumbled in her other hand secretly residing behind her back?  This is what we call bargaining and it starts early on in life.  However, it doesn't stop there.
     As I have grow older I have caught myself making bargains.  But it isn't with my parent's anymore, trying to sneak a cookie behind my back. There are many other things more important in life than cookies now, like a career, marriage, plans and goals that I have.  To get what I want out of the deal, I have found myself bartering with God.  Maybe you do the same thing.  "I will follow your plan God if______" is the pattern that is set.  While offering some of your plans to God, the most important ones hide in your hands of control.  Most of us will obey God as long as some of our plans go our way.  Our surrender has string attached.  But the surrender that God asks of us is a no-strings attached abandonment of our ways for the taking up of His.  Through God's patience and grace, I have begun to catch a glimpse of the surrender to His will that He desires from His children.   

Complete: Every Desire Brought Under God's Authority

     Thinking that we know better or that God is going to ruin all our plans, it is very tempting to only give God part of our will.  But God asks for it all.  And is He not deserving of it?  

For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all,

 therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves 

but for him who for their sake died and was raised. 
2 Corinthians 5:14-15 

     Our God is a good God who desires us to follow Him in order that we might come to know the riches that are ours in Christ.  He knows best and He asks for all of us.  Complete surrender without reserve.  While God does give us desires, even those things must be given back to Him. When our desires intersect with His, we must lay our plan down in surrender so that we can pick up His and follow wherever He leads.  It is the attitude of, "Lord, take it all.  I hold nothing back." 

Until the will...(is) brought under the authority of Christ, we have not begun to understand,

 let alone to accept, His Lordship.

- Elisabeth Elliot

Some Will Die: Laying it On The Altar

     One of the paradoxes found in scripture is that death brings life.  Could the death of some of our dreams bring life that would otherwise have been impossible?  At times the following of God's will might mean that He will put to death some of our desires.  Are you willing to lay them on the altar?  As Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac, his only son, God's promise to him, are you willing to do the same with your desires?  God may slay some but He also might resurrect others in ways you never imagined to be possible.  Follow the example of Christ, who, after pleading with His God to let "this cup pass from me" said, "not my will but yours be done." (Luke 22:42) Are you willing to surrender everything to the one who gave everything to redeem you?

The bringing of our unruly wills and affections into order- will cost us something. 

                - Elisabeth Elliot

 To Loose Is To Gain

      I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.

Philippians 3:8 

~

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot loose.

Jim Elliot(missionary martyr)

Check out 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 for some good news:)

     Following Jesus costs a lot.  It isn't the easy path for sure.  You know the verse about the path being narrow that leads to life?  Well, that word narrow can also be translated as afflicted.  If you want an easy life don't follow Christ.  But then again, what reward is there for an easy life? Temporary pleasures don't last and just as quickly as life, they come and go.  But Christ...Oh the riches that are found in the Savior! Nothing can compare to Him. If you look at it from the perspective of the here and now, following Christ costs you a lot. But if you look at it from the eternal perspective, you won't be able to understand why anyone would live for anything besides Christ.  Is He your sole pursuit?  Is He your greatest desire?

       The call to surrender is not to stop pursuing things.  The surrender that God call us to is STOP (chasing after) everything else, so that you can START pursuing Christ above everything else.  Not just seeking Him half-halfheartedly but to seek Him will all your heart!  He must be the one thing that consumes all other desires.  To Paul he considered everything else as trash, as dung compared to Christ. (Philippians 3:7-8) Careers, marriage, ministry, family should all seem second rate when our eyes ares set on Him. May HE be our greatest desire and my our lives be consumed in pursuing Him for the purpose of knowing and loving Him more. 

Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.

Psalms 73:25

It is my hope and prayer that through this series you were challenged to seek God in everything, above all else, looking to Him for guidance.  He is faithful to reveal Himself and His will when we are faithful to seek Him. May we walk in obedience. This passage from Hebrews 13:20-21 summarizes my prayer for us all as only scripture can do: 

Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the Great Shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.