Trust in the Lord with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways submit to him,
and he will make your paths straight.
(Proverbs 3:5-6)
Have you ever had an altar moment between you and the Lord? One of those moments when you take a situation and put it on the altar before the Lord and leave it there for Him to handle as He sees fit. I believe we have all had opportunities for such moments to occur; moments that reveal whether we’ll trust God or not. Moments we can use to discover just how much we are willing to surrender all to God and trust Him for the outcomes on the other side.
Remember, not trusting God and doing things our own way got the human race in the predicament it is in now. As we explored in the last post, who we listen to does matter. In some cases, we like to listen to ourselves and lean on our own understanding as the verse above states. We think with our knowledge, our expertise, our wisdom and our past experiences, we can handle the circumstances that arise in our lives. But what if these very circumstances are placed in our lives for the purpose of learning the art of surrendering and trusting God for the outcomes?
Surrender looks like…
When I googled the meaning of surrender, the following definitions stood out over all the others:
- give up or hand over (a person, right, or possession) typically on compulsion or demand.
- the action of surrendering to an opponent or powerful influence.
And in the midst of these two definitions, these phrases stood out: give up, hand over and powerful influence. These phrases caused a revamping of the question at hand, ‘Is it time to surrender?’ to the following fuller question: Are we ready to give up and hand over our circumstances to the One who has powerful influence to bring about the greatest change for good?
Biblical Examples of Surrender
In the Bible, there are many examples of those who chose to surrender their matters to God and trust Him with the outcomes instead of leaning on their own understanding to fix their problems. Here are three for us to consider:
- Joseph: He surrendered to God’s plan for his life as he was continuously unfairly treated by others and trusted God in the midst of it all. It was not the path he would have chosen for himself but a path that shaped him to be the leader that God would use to provide for His people at a later time. (Genesis 39-50)
- Jochebed: As she looked to protect her baby son Moses from death at the hands of the Pharaoh, she chose to surrender him to God and trusted God to do a better job protecting him. She placed baby Moses in a basket down the Nile River as Pharaoh killed baby boys his age throughout Egypt. Not only was Moses saved from death but was also prominently placed in the enemy’s home to be prepared for his future role. (Exodus 1-2)
- Moses: He surrendered the dire conditions of his fellow Israelites to God after he tried to solve it himself. After 40 years in the wilderness God called him up to be a part of His plan to rescue His people from Egypt. Moses eventually trusted God’s plan and had a front row seat of seeing God perform amazing miracles to free His people from the Egyptians. (Exodus 2-15)
These individuals chose to surrender the circumstances to the One who is all-powerful. They were not sure what the outcomes would be but they knew the One who can be trusted to do what was best in the situation they were facing. And the outcomes for each one are so extraordinary that here we are thousands of years later still talking about these amazing lives that were powerfully influenced by Almighty God after they surrendered the circumstances to Him.
Is it time for you to surrender?
What matter are you facing today that you are exerting all kinds of energy, time and maybe even money to solve on your own? Are you tired of trying to fix things or change people that seem immovable? Are you ready to give up and hand it over to God, the One who has the supernatural ability to change things instantly and in ways unimaginable to the human mind? Surrendering your concerns today puts you one step closer to seeing God make the paths ahead clearer for you.
Considerations 