SURRENDER

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When I feel like I can’t face the day; or when I get tired of being criticized in a condescending manner by others (mainly bosses at work), or when I remember times in the past when others have acted more like an enemy than a friend (because people are sinners by nature and continuously demonstrate that fact, and conflict is a part of life in a fallen world), I find that the answer is surrender. Surrender it all to Christ, trust in Him, and die to self. This is part of how you become a Christian in the first place, and this is also how you maintain a strong, dependent relationship with Him. The world (i.e., society) tells us that the way to happiness is to pile up ‘toys’ (i.e., material things) and riches for yourself. But riches, wealth, material goods, and even fame, though they can bring pleasure for a time, cannot truly fulfill a person. In the end, they only lead to emptiness. The way to find peace, to find joy, is to surrender your life, your future, your circumstances, and yourself to Christ. Die to self. Consider yourself dead to this world, dead to sin, and alive to Christ Jesus. Follow Him as your Master.

You talk to God through prayer, and you can tell Him all your worries, all your cares, all your desires, when you pray. Reading the Bible is your food; it’s how you put healthy stuff into your mind, and how you input godly thoughts so you will have a healthy, moral, correct attitude. Witnessing (telling others about Jesus) is how you get your spiritual exercise; Besides the fact that people are dying and going to Hell every day, which in itself should drive every Christian to tell as many people as they can about Jesus; witnessing is also how you exercise your spiritual muscles. Fellowship with other Christians is how you maintain motivation and get encouraged, in a similar way that a person interested in astronomy might join an astronomy club; you learn from others, and you get encouraged and strengthened by others who share similar interests. In addition to all these, a vastly important but often misunderstood command from Scripture is to be filled with the Holy Spirit; every Christian is indwelled by the Holy Spirit, and to be filled with the Holy Spirit basically means that He fills your every thought and is completely controlling your attitude and your actions. You become filled with the Holy Spirit by spending time with Him. The moment a Christian sins, the Holy Spirit is quenched, and they are no longer filled with the Holy Spirit. Yet, once they repent of that sin and confess it (I John 1:9), and then spend time with God again, they can once again become filled with the Holy Spirit. The more time you spend with Him (generally speaking), the more your “cup” is filled; and, the moment you sin, it’s sort of like turning that cup at an angle and pouring out most of that liquid. God is a God of relationships, and the more time you spend with Him, the more He fills you. But, when you sin, that relationship is broken, just like when you get into a fight with your best friend or your spouse, that relationship is damaged. However, once you “make up,” the relationship can be restored again.

Of course, for a person who is not a Christian, none of this can happen until and unless a relationship with Jesus Christ is initiated. A person must first acknowledge that they are a sinner and have offended a holy God, and then repent (turn away) from their sins, asking to be pardoned from all the wickedness they have committed in their life, and surrender their life and all that they are, to Jesus, and accept Him as their personal Savior and the Lord of their life. Only then will Jesus cleanse and forgive them, and only then will God the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, come to dwell inside them, and make them into a brand new creature (II Cor. 5:17). When this occurs, the person receives eternal life, and is adopted into the family of God, becoming a child of God.

by Jeff Jenkins