“God, take it. Take this stuff. And then take me.”
It’s the altar call – come lay down everything you thought was enough but realize is nothing.
It’s your white flag of surrender. Not just of your things, but your soul, you essence.
And that is salvation.
We know that. That’s the gist of it all.
Surrender is a common theme in our Christian language about salvation, but what about in our daily Christian life?
I listened to an interview last month that Bono gave to NPR about his new autobiography, called Surrender.
You can listen to the i/view, as well, at the bottom of the post.
It’s extremely powerful. When he talks about surrender briefly, you might just think, “Okay. I hear. Nice. I’ve heard it before, though.”
But please think about it. It may change your life. And I don’t just mean in a salvific way.
Yes, “surrender” is the best word for the moment of salvation that I can think of. We all know that.
But it’s also the best word for how to life after that salvation.
Sure, we know we’re to surrender to our Father’s will, we’re now Christians. So we’ll pursue love, peace, all those gifts.
But how much do we truly surrender, day to day? And what do we surrender?
Because surrendering in every way, and relationship is, to me, closer to living with Christ than anything.
Are we surrendering to our spouse? I don’t mean giving in on every fight. I mean, surrendering to their beauty as an individual made by God whom he loves deeply. If we surrender to that fact, if we surrender our view of them as “stubborn” or “unreasonable” and instead take on God’s view of them, then every interaction will be different.
We won’t have to try to be kind. We will be, because we have surrendered our view of them, and taken God’s view.
Are we surrendering to any injustice we feel at our work? Of course, God cares deeply about justice, but are we willing to surrender our bitterness and trust him with fixing the injustice? I don’t see anywhere in the Bible where we’re to take up the sword to defend ourselves from someone else’s.
Are we surrendering to the soul-destroying mess of politics? I doubt it. Instead, we form groups, causes, committees. Fine enough. But not fine if they’re leading us to become anything other than ones called to live peaceably, gently, and quietly.
And most personally, are we surrendering to the fact that God has allowed a severe trial in our lives, and that if there were any other way to accomplish his way, he would zip it on the trial.
Are we surrendering our belief that we know best about everything to the fact we know nothing, and he’s got it all.
In every circumstance, in every way shape or form.
Sounds demanding, doesn’t it. All this surrendering?
But actually, it’s profoundly liberating.
If I can truly surrender, then I can just live. I can live, knowing that the one who has always lived, lives for me and has got me.
If I can truly surrender my pride, then I’m humiliated, but free from the fear of one day being humiliated.
If I can truly surrender my need to be right, then I’m silenced, but free from the internal angst of producing facts, figures, reasons why the other person is wrong.
If I can truly surrender to Christ’s work on behalf on me, then I don’t have to fixate on how far short I fall on my work for him.
Think of your life through that word surrender, every day and in every moment, and you will see it is not giving up on life. It is giving up our life to God.
So watch the interview with Bono and think about surrender yourself.
He says something else that might stir your mind – Bono freely admits he’s still in the process of figuring out whether he’s surrendered to Christ.
Well, that’s not what a Christian would say! We know we’ve surrendered! After all, we’re Christians!
But to Christ, who sees all the ways we’ve yet to surrender, I can’t think of a better description of our ongoing life than one who’s still trying to surrender to Christ, and finding out that while salvation comes “at the moment of surrender,” the Christian life is a continual surrender of all our calcified selves.
There’s a surrender to be made in every struggle, mentally, physically, spiritually. In every relationship. In every sphere of our lives.
If we think about it hard enough, we’ll find ourselves wondering whether we’ve surrendered anything to Christ, actually, at all.
And like Bono, we can affirm that we’ll still be struggling with surrender, until we die.
Thankfully, while we can never surrender perfectly to Christ, he did to the Father.
He begged that his Father take away the cup, but in the most important sentence he ever uttered in the redemptive story, added, “Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done.”
Christ surrendered perfectly, and now we are perfect, because of it.
And we must surrender to that — the most beautiful reality of Christianity.
This has been a year of surrender for me, and a year of fighting that surrender. The surprising medical issues have forced me into new mental realms, physical ones, and spiritual ones.
What if I die, on my young kids and wife? What if I’m permanently disabled? Will I even be able to eat anything beyond a smoothie again? Will I be able to just go somewhere?
And oh God, the pain is sometimes so bad and debilitating, and why are you going to put that line in my body and that medication, and when can I see my kids and wife?
I wish I had the kind of faith that could serenely handle all this, that could quiet these obsessive concerns. Some Christians have that figured out.
But the one thing I’ve had to fall back on — while still taking my anti-anxiety medicine and all that — the ultimate thing is: I need to surrender to this. I need to surrender myself to whatever happens. If the news I find out is the worst, it’s the worst, and yet God’s plan is the best.
How do we surrender to that? Is it possible?
Maybe you can, maybe you have. There are folks with far greater faith than I.
But if anyone else struggles with this as deeply as I do, then this idea of surrender – it might mean something. It has to me.
So we pray: “Oh dear Savior, may I surrender not just my sins and soul but everything I think is best into the hands of the one who really knows best.”
If we can get to that point – I sense freedom around the corner. We’ll never continually grasp that permanent sense of freedom on earth, but that’s what heaven’s for.
And have you ever wondered why humans want freedom so much? At a collective and individual level? Because it feels like heaven and that is heaven. And yet it rarely occurs to us that freedom comes through surrender.
I’m looking forward to the freedom of total surrender one day, and seeing face-to-face the one I’ve waved the white flag to.
We’ll get there, friends. In his timing, in his love. He does it all, in his love for you.
[Photo: U2’s single, “Moment of Surrender.”
