The Surrender Walk

In one of my first blogs, I shared that the word the Lord had given me to work on this year was surrender. The ladies at my church usually get together for some devotion time and share our words in January. It just so happened that another sister of mine had received the same word as I did. We decided that we would meet up each month to go walking and discuss how our surrendering journeys were going and how we could be praying for one another in the process. I decided to name our meetups The Surrender Walks.

Since I’ve made it through the first quarter, I figured I give an update on how that’s going. Progressing but struggling. I realize it is something I have to do daily. I’m so tempted to hang onto that which the Lord has asked me to release. It’s challenging. It’s frustrating. Even saddening at times. Even when I know the why, it doesn’t always make it easier to lay the things and myself down and simply find rest and enjoyment in Him.

I felt pretty convicted as I was listening to a message and the pastor spoke these words describing our attitude when it comes to God: “‘Thanks God, but your blessings are so much more important to me than you are.’ Instead of seeking Him for Him, we’re seeking Him for what we can get from Him.”

Two raised hands. Guilty as charged.

Most of us would not want to utter those words out loud, but if our hearts could speak would they not tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

There’s a statement I wrote on my whiteboard that sits right across from where I typically type and lie to sleep. It reads: “I will seek the Lord as my most important need; I will inquire of Him.” I wrote this statement after a long season of learning that God is my complete security. The words were prompted after I read Zephaniah 1:6: “those who turn back from following the Lord and neither seek the Lord nor inquire of Him.”

I believe we stop seeking the Lord as our greatest need when we start indulging in the things He has asked us to surrender. And I believe we stop inquiring of Him when we know we aren’t ready and refuse to give those things up.

One of the greatest lessons I’ve learned in my relationship with God is simply just to go to Him. With the good, the bad, and the ugly. When I’m fervent and desire Him and when I am spiritually dry and reluctant. When I am the latter, I often ask Him to help me get back to the first. But sometimes not until after I have fully vented my condition and the conditions I feel He has placed me under.

This sucks. I don’t like this. But I want this Lord. I like this. Why can’t I… Ugh. When Lord when? Why Lord why? If you don’t take this, I’m calling him and I’m going over there.

I am completely aware that I am a grown woman. I can truly do almost anything I want when I want. No fences or chains are blocking my path. And yet there is something. It’s remembering that I am a daughter of the King. It’s remembering that I represent Him at all times, in the light and the dark. It’s remembering that I was bought at a high price. And so though I have much liberty to do as this world tells me to fancy, I restrain myself. I surrender my desires and free will and make them obedient to the will and call of God.

The world would have you to think that this is repressive and repulsive. But I assure you it is safety. I know because I have colored outside the lines before and made a complete mess of the picture I was trying to create.

So one of the things I do to help me remain in a state of surrender is to remember. Another is to meditate on truth. Did you know that the word surrender is not in the Bible? Not anywhere. But many passages point us to it or give us a picture of it. Here are two of the passages I had selected at the beginning of this year’s One Word Resolution that I suppose I’ll stop and meditate on now:

• “I know, O Lord, that the way of man is not in himself, that it is not in man who walks to direct his steps.” Jeremiah 10:23

• “My son, give me your heart, and let your eyes observe my ways.” Proverbs 23:26

I do believe that if I keep my eyes upon Him, He will lead me to the best of all things at His appointed time.

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