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Day 3: Surrender
Readings: Proverbs 22:4; Romans 12:1,2
Proverbs 22:4 (The Voice)
4 A humble person who fears the Eternal
can expect to receive wealth, honor, and life.
There are three habitual emphases in
Infinitum: surrender, generosity, and mission. Surrender?
It means ‘cease resistance to an enemy or opponent and
submit to their authority.’
The recognition is that in our natural state we are
opposed to God, living in adversarial hostility to our
Creator. And we
have to surrender.
Total capitulation.
And that includes submission to God’s authority.
And when do we do that?
Life.
And while there is a moment of total
surrender, it doesn’t end there.
The Passion Translation uses the phrase ‘continually
surrender’ a couple of times (Matthew 16:24; Mark 8:34) to
describe our posture toward God.
We are to continually surrender to Jesus, live in
continual surrender, in submission to His authority.
This, of course, is in stark contrast
with the normative stance all of us hold.
How does it look?
Romans 12:1-2 (TPT) explains it this
way:
1 Beloved friends, what should be our
proper response to God’s marvelous mercies?
I encourage you to surrender yourselves to God to be
His sacred, living sacrifices.
And live in holiness, experiencing all that delights
His heart. For
this becomes your genuine expression of worship.
2 Stop imitating the ideals and
opinions of the culture around you, but be inwardly
transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of
how you think. This will empower you to discern God’s will as
you live a beautiful life, satisfying and perfect in His eyes.
On the positive side:
We are to live in holiness.
We are to experience all that delights
His heart.
On the negative side:
‘Stop imitating the ideals and opinions
of the culture.’
Allow Holy Spirit to totally reform how
we think.
And we will be empowered to discern
God’s will.
The exercise is for us to walk in
surrender; to live a holy life, we experience all that
delights His heart.
Every day we choose to refuse to imitate the culture’s
ideals and opinions.
Every day we choose to allow Holy Spirit to reform our
thinking. And
every day we are empowered to discern God’s will.
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