”Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you.” Psalm 55:22 "Trust in the LORD with all your heart; and lean not on your own understanding." Proverbs 3:5 Can we really cast all our cares on the Lord? Will God really sustain us?
The verses above are about surrendering our lives to God. So exactly what is surrender and how do we do it? I have found that surrendering my life to God has been a very personal experience and one not easily attained or explained. So I begin my brief explanation here by looking up the word surrender. Here are some definitions: 1. To relinquish possession or control to another; 2. To give up in favor of another; 3. To give up or give back something that has been granted; 4. To give as a present or to make a gift of.
I view my personal surrender to God as a very mystical experience. I have not always easily understood what was happening to me in surrender. Our human intelligence and our physical senses are conditioned in worldly ways. We have been taught to use our physical senses and intelligence to understand things. The experience of direct communion with God and His Ultimate Reality in surrender can sometimes be misinterpreted by our finite egos and confusing. This is why we are told not to lean on our own understanding.
The promises in the Bible and in the Scriptures of other religions were so incredible to me that I felt that no matter what I had to do to surrender to God, I would do it. I have never been one to rely only on what other people told me. I started doing research back in the seventies, way before there was a public Internet. I would spend hours at public libraries reading. I attended services of many religions and spiritual organizations. I asked a lot of questions.
I guess when we are finally tired of eating husks, like the prodigal son we get up and go to the Father. (Luke 15:18) As we go through various stages and processes and grow in understanding, we finally come to a place where we gladly bow to God. "For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall give praise to God." Romans 14:11. It doesn't happen with a feeling of bondage. It happens with a sense of joyful freedom and power.
How do we surrender? I suppose if I could tell you how you can surrender right now it wouldn't have taken me so long to do it myself. I love Emelie Cady's book, "Lessons in Truth" where she said, "Each man must sooner or later learn to stand alone with his God; nothing else avails..." I also love this article, "The Difference Between Submission and Surrender" from a wonderful Sufi site packed with information about so many things called Surrender Works by my friend Ali Ansari. This article nicely explained surrender to God versus submission for me. I have not yet met Ali in person, but I took his 10-week course in self-understanding and loved it. The time I spent with Ali on the telephone during the 10-week course was tremendously beneficial and lovely. Ali has since passed away.
If everyone was surrendered to God, the world would be a much different place. All throughout worldly time evil has used our separateness, the differences in religious traditions and heritages to keep us separate from each other and thereby from God. We simply cannot love someone and fear them at the same time. A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand - Luke 11:17. If we fear someone rather than love them, we are not in Christ. Jesus said to love, not fear, our enemy - Matthew 5:44. If we submit to something or someone because of fear, we are not in Christ. The love us Christ is already in us, but because we have free will we can choose fear rather than love. Surrender to God and Christ's love happens one person at a time. Your personal surrender to God happens inside you. The Kingdom of God is within you - Luke 17:21.
People feared the Pharisees and did their best to submit to all the requirements of the Pharisees. Read what Jesus said about the Pharisees - Luke 7:36-50, 18:10-14, 20:46-47, Matthew 7:21-23, 23:1-39 - the list goes on. Why just listen to other people's opinions about what Jesus said? How do you know who the Pharisees of today really are? Jesus said to be careful not to let the yeast of the Pharisees work it's way into your mind and your heart - Matthew 6:16. Ask and it shall be given you, seek and you will find, and knock and it will be opened unto you. For everyone who asks, receives. He that seeks, finds. To him that knocks, it will be opened - Matthew 7:7-8, Luke 11:9. Surrender is allowing God to lead you moment by moment, but you need to be quiet to hear Him. Test God out and prove Him - Malachi 3:10, Romans 12:2.
The Kingdom of God is not a matter of talk, but of power - 1 Corinthians 4:20.
If you enjoyed this post, please go on and read my post Quieting the Mind in Meditation, and The Yoga of Jesus and also my post Yoga and Christ.
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you, Terrie
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