FSBO

I was listening to a sermon the other day and either my own mind came up with this or it was God’s Spirit revealing truth – or at least a different point of view to look from.  Now, this is all kind of off the top of my head.  I haven’t searched scriptures to verify the theological accuracy of these ideas 🙂 But let’s take a quick look at the concept of “surrender.”

The act of surrender is a daily practice for those who call Jesus “Lord”.  When we wake up in the morning, our natural inclination is to take life into our own hands and let God watch.  Thankfully, God knows us well and Jesus told us we would need to deny ourselves daily.  After listening to the aforementioned sermon, I’m starting to wonder about surrender, what it really means, and what motivates surrender in my life.

Often times, especially while partaking in the Lord’s Supper (communion, during worship services) I meditate on what Jesus did for me.  I think of Jesus giving everything he had for me (and us).   It would seem natural to think “Jesus gave it all for me, therefore, I owe it to Him to give my life to Him.”  Is this way of thinking right?  Am I thinking that I am indebted to Jesus and therefore I have to pay Him back for what He did for me?  Do I OWE him my life because he gave His life for me?  If that were true,  doesn’t that make Jesus’ sacrifice more of a barter than a gift?  Jesus gave to me without any requirement of repayment.  It’s not a trade-off.

So now what I’m thinking is, in stead of “surrender” being a matter of giving and receiving, perhaps it’s a matter of ownership.  God owns all he has created – including me.  Perhaps surrender is about us re-acknowledging that God owns us and WE don’t own ourselves.  Yes, in a sense, it’s the same as “giving your life to Jesus”.  But I don’t know if I’ve really ever owned myself.

We often lead an existence with only a vague sense of God’s presence.   It’s so easy for us to lose sight of God’s ownership of the world (and everything in it) because there are much louder and more consistent messages in our lives that drill the ideas of personal possession and ownership into our consciousness.

In those moments when I remember that Jesus bought my life with His death, I need to re-align my way of thinking and humbly surrender ownership rights.

What do you think, reader?  Perhaps it’s all semantics.  Don’t know.  Whichever way you look at it, though, for a disciple of Jesus, surrender is a big deal.  And it’s really difficult.  And COMPLETE surrender might just be a rare quality.  Complete surrender – is it even possible?  Sounds like a good blog post.  We’ll see!