Day 15: Surrender a Terrifying Act of Trust
Nancy Leigh DeMoss, in her book Surrender: The Heart God Controls, tells the embarrassing story of a woman on vacation:
Joan spent all of the first days of her vacation sunbathing on the roof of her hotel. She wore a bathing suit that first day, but on the second, she decided that no one could see her way up there, and she slipped out of it for an overall tan. She’s hardly begun when she heard someone running up the stairs. She was lying on her stomach, so she just pulled a towel over her backside.
“Excuse me, Miss,” said the flustered assistant manager of the hotel, out of breath from running up the stairs. “The Hilton doesn’t mind your sunbathing on the roof, but we’d appreciate your wearing a bathing suit as you did yesterday.”
“What difference does it make?” Joan asked calmly. “No one can see me up here, and besides, I’m covered with towel.”
“Not exactly,” said the embarrassed gentleman. “You’re lying on the dining room skylight.”
How terrifying and more than slightly embarrassing! Surrender can be terrifying because it leaves us naked before God, with nothing to hide. Surrender is not easy. We often don’t do it because we are afraid of the unknown and afraid that we will never get back what we surrendered. We hold tightly to the good that we do know because we cannot see the greater good we do not know. As Christ followers, we know the One in whom we’ve placed our trust. He has promised to provide for us, share His pleasure with us, protect us and give us His enduring presence.
Read Luke 22:39-46
Questions to consider:
What can you learn from Jesus on the Mount of Olives in Luke 22? What do you need to surrender to God?
Prayer:
Father, I abandon myself into your hands; do with me what you will. Whatever you may do, I thank you:
I am ready for all, I accept all. Let only your will be done in me, and in all your creatures. I wish no more than this, O Lord. (Source: Charles de Foucauld)
By Sarah Jobson
For further reading:
Surrender: The Heart God Controls by Nancy Leigh DeMoss
Prayer by Richard Foster