God spoke to me this weekend. It was a very rough last few days. Emotional wreck is the best way to describe me. Here's what he said...
Q. Are you willing to surrender everything to me? I mean everything.
A. But what do you mean? Of course I've surrendered to you. I believe in you don't I? I try to live for you.
Q. But you still hold on to things in your heart. You reserve them as your right. You think you deserve them. In fact you are mad at me for not giving you what you think you need. Right?
A. But I know those things are only at your grace and mercy...
Q. But you still think they are yours, your right. You have to sacrifice them to me.
A. Um... what?
Q. Sacrifice, like Abraham sacrificed Isaac.
Abraham was asked to sacrifice his miracle and promised child. His only son, whom he loved. It made no sense. Why would God ask him to give up what had been promised to him as a miracle and symbol of God's plans for his chosen nation? It was the ultimate act of submission, of trust, of surrender. Abraham so believed God would be true to his word, that he was good, that he would raise his son again that he got up and obeyed. Immediate obedience, without question, without hesitation. He built an altar with his own hands as an act of submission to his God. He laid aside reason, and his love for his child and put him on the altar. He held nothing back from God.
Q. Can you sacrifice your love and will and mind like that? Can you surrender fully to my plans for you? Can you trust me?
A. But God those aren't bad things I want to hold on to...
Q. But they keep you from giving me your whole heart. I want all or nothing. Your whole heart is what is a pleasing sacrifice to me. Not partial surrender, but total surrender. Its only in my will that you will be free.
A. I'm not free am I?
Q. No, you are slave to what you think you need.
A. I see now... I'm chained to those things, I hold so tightly to them. I see the whole world and even you in light of those things. They've begun to suffocate me, they are so heavy. I didn't realize it until today. I'm chained to my security blankets, my dreams, my so called needs. You are right, I have to surrender them to you. I've carried them my whole life.
Q. It will be one of the hardest things you will ever do. Do you trust me? Do you trust that what is on the other side is my good and perfect will for you?
A. Yes
Q. Then build your altar, sacrifice and surrender totally to me. Then you will feel freedom.
I built the altar. Crying the whole time at what I was giving up. I don't know what life is going to be like without them. What if God doesn't restore them again to me like he did for Abraham? There is no guarantee. I had to take the risk. I can't live this way anymore. I want His freedom. I want His blessings. I crawled up there along with all the things I'd placed on it and I let it burn up. A holy and pleasing sacrifice to God. Maybe the only true sacrifice I've ever made.
And I do feel freedom. I am at peace. Its only in His will that we are free.
Are you free? Have you surrendered fully? What do you hold back as your own? Christ is our picture of true submission to our Father. His sacrifice saved us and restored us. Abraham was just a taste of what full surrender looks like. Follow Christ. Submit to God, to His will, and find freedom and peace and blessing.
