…come, follow Me. —Luke 18:22
{CHAMBERS} “Where our individual desire dies and sanctified
surrender lives. One of the greatest hindrances in coming to Jesus is the
excuse of our own individual temperament. We make our temperament and our
natural desires barriers to coming to Jesus. Yet the first thing we realize
when we do come to Jesus is that He pays no attention whatsoever to our natural
desires. […] There is actually only one thing you can dedicate to God, and that
is your right to yourself (see Romans 12:1). If you will give God your right to
yourself, He will make a holy experiment out of you— and His experiments always
succeed. The one true mark of a saint of God is the inner creativity that flows
from being totally surrendered to Jesus Christ. […] A saint realizes that it is
God who engineers his circumstances; consequently there are no complaints, only
unrestrained surrender to Jesus. […] If you abandon everything to Jesus, and
come when He says, “Come,” then He will continue to say, “Come,” through you.
You will go out into the world reproducing the echo of Christ’s “Come.” That is
the result in every soul who has abandoned all and come to Jesus.”
{ELGIN} Have you ever said or perhaps heard someone say “That is
just the way I am” or “That is how our family is” Romans 12:1-2 says that we are to offer ourselves to God and be
transformed and not be conformed to this world any more. When we are satisfied with our lives when
they are inconsistent with the expressed Word of God and life of Jesus it is
because we are focused on flesh – our old nature. We are content with it or perhaps think it
inescapable. If I asked you, “Do you believe
the Word of God is truth?” My guess is
that you would say yes. Then I would say
to you … “If you are a Christian then the Word is true for you. God has given you the supernatural capacity
to be and do.” So what is the
problem? Surrender. We find comfort in the “old life”. 2
Corinthians 5:17 says “If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation –
like a butterfly – old things have passed away and all things are becoming new!”
(my emphasis) Let me tell you that if you are not willing to seek after those
things that will strengthen you in your new life then you will live your life
with both feet firmly planted in your old nature, all the while wondering why
being a Christian is not “working for you”.
There is a tension in all of us between fear and faith. To let go and let God requires
surrender. There that word is
again. Matthew 16:24-26 “Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would
come after me, let him deny himself and
take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose
it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it
profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a
man give in return for his soul?”
You must say no to your old
nature and the way you do that is by saying yes to God. Paul wrote in Romans 7 that he does the things he
does not want to do and does not do the things he wants and knows to do that are consistent with his
Faith. Then he says that answer is Jesus. Nothing has changed … the answer for you and
me is the same as it was for Paul.
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