Unconditional Surrender

A visiting missionary preached at my church a couple weeks ago. Among many encouraging and convicting things he shared was the story of how God brought him and his wife into the ministry they have today.

The story is theirs to tell, and I couldn’t possibly do it full justice in this post, but I did want to draw our attention to one specific statement he made. This faithful Christian said that when God first began to call him into missions, he struggled. He said that he had surrendered to God, but with conditions.

Does that sound familiar? It did to me. Looking back, I can clearly see how I have been guilty of that very thing over and over. It is easy to sing “I surrender all,” but somewhere in our heart and mind be thinking, “as long as it isn’t this or that thing I don’t want.”  

Here are a couple examples from my own life:

When I was born, my parents joked that I would become an organist, because I was born on the same day as J.S. Bach, the famous organ composer who dedicated all his works to God. I apparently also had long, spindly fingers and restless feet—perfect for playing the organ.

Over the years, I heard this story over and over and each time, I thought or even said aloud, “That’s silly. I don’t want to play the organ.” or, “I don’t want to be a church musician.” During my teen years, this story seemed especially tiresome, and I rolled my eyes inwardly every time my parents brought it up.

As God worked in my heart and began the slow but dramatic turnaround in my desires and thinking, there came a day when a dear lady at church said casually, “Have you ever considered learning to play the organ?”

The words brought instant conviction. Though the question was not intended as a rebuke, the Holy Spirit used it to bring to my attention the fact that I had, indeed, never considered playing the organ—and that I needed to.

As I write this, I have been my church’s organist for about twelve years.—And can I tell you something? I love it. Once I took the “but not as an organist” condition out of my supposed surrender to God’s will for my life, the very thing I had refused to even consider doing became a source of joy and purpose.

On a deeper and more personal level, (which is where most of our conditions reside) there is something I struggled for years to surrender to God. For as long as I can remember, my plan for my future was to be a wife and mother. As I grew into my teen years, I was constantly on the lookout for “prince charming,” and I remember being intensely uncomfortable whenever anyone would mention a single missionary or Christian worker. I didn’t want to think about the fact that God does sometimes allow Christians to remain single.

As I entered into my college years, I told myself that God probably wouldn’t bring a husband along for me until after I had finished my college degree, so I tried to be patient and focus on my schooling, all the while giving God a conditional surrender. “I want Your will for my life—but not singleness!”

True surrender is more than just a one-time thing, but it usually has a starting place. For me, the crisis came one day as I sat alone in my car, during what had previously been used as studying time during my last few years of college. I had finished my degree, and as I sat there pondering what to use the time for now, I came face to face with the realization that marriage wasn’t God’s next step for me after all.

I had been teaching for quite a few years already, and knew God wasn’t leading me to change occupations, but I had a sense that there was something more—but not marriage.

I had watched several friends over the years let their singleness become a source of bitterness that slowly destroyed them from the inside out, or else led them into rushed marriages that didn’t last. I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to let singleness destroy my life, but how?

God had given me a deep desire to show the world around me that God’s way works, and in my mind up to that point, I had assumed that “God’s way” was to be demonstrated through marriage and family life. That had been my anchor, and now I felt like God had cut the rope and left me drifting.

So I made a choice. I asked God to show me how to glorify Him His way. I surrendered my vision for my life, my plan of how I was going to glorify God, and I surrendered to the one thing I had dreaded for so long.

That was the day I sensed the Holy Spirit leading me to change the focus of my blog, which before had been mostly just my scattered thoughts about different topics as I prepared for what I thought my future would be as a homemaker. Instead, God turned a corner in my writing that day, and Learning Ladyhood became the devotional blog you’re reading today.

As I said before, true, unconditional surrender is not a one-time event, but since that day, through all the daily ups and downs of life, I have had an abiding sense of purpose, an assurance that God knows what He is doing in my life. I know that my singleness isn’t some sort of punishment or lesson to learn, but a season (albeit an enduring one) of being set apart for God in a special way, and for a specific purpose.

As I wrote that first blog post about the long, straight pathway that seemed to stretch ahead so very far into the distance, I had a deep certainty that God wanted me to write. I yielded to His prompting, and chose to make my life and heart an open book, so that others could learn the same things God was teaching me. There and then, I changed my “Yes, but…” to an unconditional “Yes, Lord.”

That was just four years ago, and today I have eleven books in print, and my own publishing company/book ministry. Over the past two weeks alone, this blog had visits from 21 different countries. I have over a hundred subscribers who receive my weekly update email, and I have had the blessing of hearing from many people whom God has used my writings to help, convict, and encourage!

I don’t say any of this to point to myself. Any achievements I see today are a direct result of that moment when I stopped putting conditions on my surrender and began to give Him my full obedience—no matter what.

Now, how about you, dear reader? Is there anything in your life that you have made a condition to serving God? Perhaps it’s something God has withheld, that you are trying to hold over Him as leverage. (“I’ll do whatever You call me to if…”) Or maybe it’s something God has given you, that has become more important to you than your obedience to God’s will.

In 1 Samuel 15, Saul greets the prophet Samuel with the joyful proclamation,

“Blessed be thou of the Lord: I have performed the commandment of the Lord”(v.13)

The problem was, Saul hadn’t obeyed. That is, he had only partially obeyed what God had told him to do. In fact, he kept some of the very things God said to destroy, in order to offer them to the Lord as a sacrifice. Here is how God summarizes His attitude toward what Saul had done:

“Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry…” (vv.22-23a)

You see, all those years I was telling God, “Yes, Lord…but not singleness,” I wasn’t actually serving God at all. Although I wouldn’t have necessarily been able to put it into words, I was trying to use service as a way to manipulate God into giving me what I wanted.

My desire to glorify God as a wife and mother had become an idol, and I was terrified at the thought that God could want me to stay single. But once I placed my singleness in His hands and chose to serve Him regardless of what His will for my life would be, I began to have a peace, joy, and fulfillment I had never known before.

I don’t know if God’s will for my life will always be service through singleness, but I can truly tell you that I am not just passively content, but actually happy. I have a purpose, and the security of knowing my future, as well as my present, are in the hands of my perfectly wise Heavenly Father.

I no longer whine or sulk over my plan for my life, but as long as I keep my eyes on God, I can rejoice that His will is truly good, and acceptable, and perfect! (Romans 12:2)

I marvel at just how God has chosen to use my feeble service to Him, and all because I repented of my rebellion and chose to truly surrender—with no conditions.

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 

And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” 

Romans 12:1-2