Surrender And Then Surrender More

Contempt prior to investigation. I was dwelling on a conversation I had today with a friend. We talked about spiritual perspectives, opinions we share and opinions in which we differ. Upon reflection God's Word does not lend itself to opinion though opinion is offered enthusiastically as the Word of God. I saw myself in that framework. I realized how much of my spiritual life has been built and supported by opinions rather than scripture plain and simple.

I believe this bent towards opinion as opposed to the acceptance of the Word of God at face value stems from my desire to find a detour around the untarnished truth.

I thought of David and Saul. David would not speak against Saul because Saul was a man of God and David's king. David surrendered himself to the admonition in scripture regarding the respect due God's anointed. This is the point at which I saw my opionated and arrogant self speaking of the various virtues and vices of people in leadership in our church or in other churches. The well-meaning gossip that comes so easily to mind, the smug glance and unspoken judgement passing through my thoughts fly in the face of God's will and instruction. Who am I that I should judge the God of the universe?

In one form or another I am continually at the point of surrender. At first that sounds repressive and controlling. Submission of my will was not a plan I had for my life. Even a cursory look at my life thus far would prove conclusively that I submitted my will on a whim. Indeed I seemed determined to exercise an anti-will campaign for years. Yet I saw myself possessing a strong will that I would not surrender. My nature held a cunning and baffling ability to lie to myself. Years later, when all my efforts had been exhausted, I found a total surrender and submission of my will to be filled with the freedom I sought most of my life. It is a bit of a mental exercise to find, after years of resistance, that the prison I saw in surrender did not exist. I had to escape the actual prison my self-will had built. Escape the bondage of self-will and run towards the freedom of surrendering my will. 

The task set before me each day is to surrender yet again and again with joy and of my own free will. In that choice I am found.