All to Him I freely give;
I will ever love and trust Him,
In His presence daily live.”
The sermon winds down and the congregants, packed into their assigned pews, and in rote memory, almost chant-like, mumble lifeless words of holy surrender. The passion with which surrender is sung sadly does not match the depth of the words being sung. Still yet the lyric continues on to express what the radically surrendered life looks like:
“Humbly at His feet I bow,
Worldly pleasures all forsaken…
Make me, Savior, wholly Thine…
Lord, I give myself to Thee…
I surrender all,
I surrender all;
All to Thee, my blessed Savior,
I surrender all.”
Nothing held back, in humility at the Savior’s nail-scarred feet, turning in repentance away from the sinful desires of the human heart and the immoral temptations of a degrading culture, the one who is truly surrendered, surrenders all.
There is not a chapter of life that is not surrendered. There is no room to the house of life that has a closed door to the Lord. Rather, all areas are submitted: thoughts, motivations, conversations, relationships, ambitions, actions. All of self is brought under subjection to the final authority of Jesus.
And this perspective is not a new one. Jesus has been speaking of this proper prioritization since He began His ministry here on earth two-thousand years ago. Those who desired to be known by Him and to be called His disciples were the ones who surrendered all and were submitted to the holy will of the Father. Hear His voice clearly declaring in Luke 14:33, “whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.” Forsaking all, pursue Jesus. Chase after Him with all that you have surrendered to the pursuit.
Food For Thought: How do your priorities line up with the “all-in” perspective of Jesus? In what ways have you not “surrendered all”?
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