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UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER — UNCONDITIONAL ACCEPTANCE #3

ONE QUICK HOUR OF FREEDOM

A joke was going around a few years ago that I may not get exactly right, but this at least is the gist of it:

One of the provinces of the former Soviet Union — and this was back before the breakup — said to the bosses in the Kremlin, "We'd like to be free and independent. How about it?" The answer from Moscow came back immediately: "No! Never! Unthinkable!"

"Well, how about for just a week? Could we be free for a week?" "No! Nyet!"

"How about just a day? Twenty-four hours?" "No."

"How about for an HOUR?"

Well, finally, the politboro decided, what can an hour hurt? So at last they gave in. "All right, for ONE HOUR, you can be free and independent. One hour . . . starting right now."

That little province, so the story goes, IMMEDIATELY declared war on Switzerland — and five minutes later surrendered . . . to . . . Switzerland. End of story.

All this week here on The Voice of Prophecy, our title has been: "Unconditional SURRENDER — Unconditional Acceptance." And we're just now, on Wednesday, even beginning to think about that word SURRENDER. And friend, there's a reason for that. It makes all the difference in the WORLD who you surrender TO. Have you ever considered that?

Our little fictional province, back in the opening story, wanted to surrender to a GOOD government. In that little one-hour window of opportunity, they looked on their map and asked themselves: "Quick! Who shall we surrender TO?" And so they picked a nation with a long reputation for fairness, for neutrality, for decent human rights and all the rest.

Perhaps you remember the wrenching historical saga of Masada, where a group of Israelite zealots committed mass suicide rather than surrender to an EVIL enemy. Death, to them, was better than the wrong kind of surrender.

In contrast to that, do you remember those televised images from the Desert Storm conflict, where starving and terrified Iraqi soldiers were DESPERATE to surrender to the U.N. troops? Almost kissing their feet! "What took you so long? We've been waiting for you." That kind of thing.

Let me say again: the wisdom of surrender depends on who you are surrendering TO.

Citizens of this rebel planet are invited in the Bible to offer up unconditional surrender . . . to a God who unconditionally accepts them. And friend, in my view, the only way we ever CAN experience unconditional surrender is if we grasp the truth that God really does love us and accept us UNCONDITIONALLY. Otherwise, we can't ever do it. We never WILL do it.

We've talked on previous Voice of Prophecy broadcasts about the idea that what we surrender is not THINGS. We don't give up bad habits or a pile of stashed-away sins or a list of cherished vices. Surrender isn't giving up four things or forty or four HUNDRED things. Surrender is giving up US; it's giving up ON us. It's giving up the IDEA or the hope that we can do ANYTHING for ourselves.

You recall, of course, the great old Christian hymn, "I Surrender All," written by Methodist-Episcopalian minister Judson VanDeVenter in the year 1896. And when he wrote that word ALL — "I Surrender ALL" — he wasn't think of "all my sins" or "all my problems." True, there's a line in Verse Two which says, "Worldly pleasures all forsaken." But the essence of this magnificent song is in the very next line, which goes like this: "Take ME, Jesus, take ME now."

What do you think of that? How do you feel about absolute, unconditional surrender? Laying down ALL your weapons, ALL your defenses? Unless it's come pounding home to you that God unconditionally loves and accepts you, it can be a most frightening encounter, can't it?

One of the best treatises on this very topic is to be found in C. S. Lewis' essay, "Is Christianity Hard or Easy?" — which comes from the book Beyond Personality. He addresses the oh-so-real temptation for most of us to think that Christianity is just something we can kind of "add on," like a shiny new accessory on our car . . . but that we can keep the same car. "I want to be what I already am," we say, "but now I'll add on a bit of Jesus."

"We are still taking our natural self as the starting point."
That's Lewis' way of describing our attitude. And then he goes on to say this:
"The Christian way is different: harder . . . AND easier. Christ says `Give me ALL. I don't want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want YOU. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don't want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don't want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked — the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: My own will shall become yours."
Sometimes curious onlookers walk into a Christian church and they see a line printed in the bulletin and they say to themselves: "Oh, no! These people are going to want ten percent of my money!" Friend, Jesus doesn't ask for ten percent of your money. He wants ALL of your money. He wants you to think of your entire paycheck, your bank account, your home and your property and your jet skis and your collection of CDs . . . as being HIS. And you — as His loyal subject, surrendered to Him — you spend those dollars and manage those resources as though they were HIS. You're simply the person entrusted with those divine assets.

And then you say, "Oh dear, I'm going to have to give up a few hours a week to go to church and then another hour or two being good to orphans and widows." Again, friend — God wants ALL of you. ALL of your time. He wants your unconditional surrender, so that you consider all 168 hours each week as belonging to Him; you're on call to Him all day every day, all week every week. You're on beeper alert all the time.

Same thing with your talents, your abilities. Maybe you can preach on the radio; or maybe your skills lie more in the area of hospitality or being a loving, patient mother. You may be good with foster children or the homeless. But you don't give out a little dribble a week — just a dab when you can spare it. No, you've given God ALL. You're all His.

Well, this is scary, isn't it? We like to use the expression "radical discipleship" here at The Voice of Prophecy. I didn't coin that phrase, but I appreciate what it implies. This is something very, very new . . . very, very life-changing. And C. S. Lewis goes on and adds these plain, straight-to-the-heart words:

"The terrible thing, the almost IMPOSSIBLE thing, is to hand over your whole self — all your wishes and precautions — to Christ. But it is far easier than what we are all trying to do instead. For what we are trying to do is to remain what we call `(quote) ourselves,' to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be `(quote) good.' We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way — centered on money or pleasure or ambition — and hoping, in spite of this, to behave honestly and chastely and humbly. And that is exactly what Christ warned us you could not do. As He said, a thistle cannot produce figs. If I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seed, I cannot produce wheat. Cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat. If I want to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface. I must be plowed up and re-sown."
It goes back to that imaginary little province at the beginning of our program. They wanted to surrender to Switzerland. But, friend, that would involve leaving behind COMPLETELY their former identity. They'd have to disband their previous cabinet and constitution and senate and government and all the rest . . . and ACCEPT the rule of their new authority. Their old loyalties would have to go; they'd have to think of Bern as their new capital city, the Swiss franc as their new money, the Swiss Bundesrat as their new governing body. They might even have to learn to speak German! That would all be part of what it means to unconditionally surrender.

And do you know something else? They might have to often remind themselves during moments of doubt — or maybe when they wistfully longed for the old days — "No! This choice of surrender was a wise one! We surrendered to a good authority, to a government that WANTED us and ACCEPTED us. We're GLAD we did it!"

So often you and I decide to surrender to God; we really do. But the next day all of our old desires and selfish little plans come roaring right back at us. Here's how Lewis describes this lifelong challenge:

"All YOUR wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day. Standing back from all your natural fussings and frettings; coming in out of the wind."
Isn't that a beautiful challenge? But it gets even better. Listen:
"We can only do it for moments at first. But from those moments the new sort of life will be spreading through our systems: because now we are letting Him work at the right part of us. It is the difference between paint, which is merely laid on the surface, and a dye or stain which soaks right through."
Friend . . . Ken and I are no great examples when it comes to this business of unconditional surrender. Those temptations come rushing in at us too; there are times when we'd like to pat ourselves on the back and rule the world. And we have to keep stepping back and remembering that we surrendered and ARE surrendering each day to a God who unconditionally loves and accepts us.

I will say this: we've experienced enough of this business of surrender to know that we love it — and we want much more.

How about you?