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Logically, I know that surrendering all to the Lord will be the best thing I ever do…
But it's not an easy task, especially for a perfectionist/border-line control freak like me. I like to be in control of things. I like to know what my future is going to look like in 5 years. I like my days to go exactly as I plan them, and I get frustrated when they don't.
Logically, I know that surrendering all to the Lord is the best thing I can do. But this is a place where I really struggle sometimes.
Surrender. It's a word we typically associate with giving up or giving in. It's a word that usually has a negative connotation around it. But the surrender I'm talking about is the act of handing something over. It's abandoning oneself and relinquishing control.
This surrender involves complete trust and lying facedown at the feet of Jesus and saying "all that I have is yours, all that I am is because of you, and my life is entirely in your hands". And this is the word I'm choosing to define my 2020 year.
You know the Lord is trying to tell you something when a certain word keeps coming up in your life.
The word surrender starting showing up a lot around April. I wrote it down in my notebook because I had a feeling that God was trying to tell me something. It was popping up in sermons, in my bible study, in songs, and in normal everyday life. It seemed like every time I turned around the Lord was reminding me of something else I needed to surrender to Him.
Surrender my time. My hopes and dreams. My future. My worries and anxieties. My plans. My desire to control everything in my life.
I struggle with surrendering certain parts of my life to God, but then trying to hold on to other parts. Surrendering Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights? No big deal at all. Surrendering time during the day to do a bible study? Easy. Surrendering my future and my plans and my expectations for my life? Ooooh. Ouch.
In reality, I have so many things I'm holding on to and gripping as tightly as I can. I have so many areas in my life where I am trying to control it. But God is calling me to let go and surrender everything to His good and perfect will.
He's calling me to surrender my time and use it to further His Kingdom and do things that will impact eternity.
He's calling me to surrender my wants and desires and realize that He gives me everything I need and more.
He's calling me to surrender my worries and anxieties and to lay them at His feet and not let them have power in my life.
He's calling me to surrender control and to realize that He is sovereign and He is the one who is truly in control.
He's calling me to surrender my future and my plans and my expectations, and know that His perspective and His plan is far greater than anything I can imagine.
He's calling me to trust Him completely and not just half-heartedly with my life. He's calling me to surrender ALL.
So this new year will be a year of surrender.
A year of me saying "here I am Lord, have your way with my life". A year of saying "Lord not my will, but you will be done".
A year of stepping into the peace that comes with surrendering everything you have to the Lord.
A year of laying my life down at the feet of Jesus, surrendering everything to him, and being obedient in His will and His plan for my life.
This a year full of trust, faith, obedience, and surrender.
"I surrender, I surrender. I want to know you more, I want to know you more."