“The condition of God’s blessing is absolute surrender of all into His hands. Praise God! If our hearts are willing for that, there is no end to what God will do for us, and to the blessing God will bestow.”
Andrew Murray, Absolute Surrender
It’s no surprise that Moody Press publishes Murray’s text. And this sounds so very familiar to us as the decendents of the revivalists. But it’s just not in Scripture.
God’s grace isn’t something you “get” when you’re good enough. Then it wouldn’t be grace! God’s plan doesn’t fall apart if you fail to wear pantyhose on the right day. God’s bigger than I am. If I had to wait on my being good enough, I’d never get God’s blessing. But that catch-22 is so effective at selling books, at garnering campers, at keeping us in our hamster wheel. But we just get so tired of trying to measure up.
This explains weird reactions and comments I’ve gotten over the years. I saw people scratch their heads when an “outsider” clearly received a wonderful, long-awaited blessing from God. The cognitive dissonance for many around me was startling. Did he repent? Was his action acceptable in God’s sight? Maybe we are the ones that are wrong? It’s NONE of those. God blesses us in spite of us all the time. He’s not keeping a list and checking it twice and going to find out who’s naughty and nice.
After Elise was born, I got a few of these “talking out of school” comments. We felt so feeble, so very frail. I was so weak that I didn’t even know how to pray for God’s help. I just didn’t know what to pray. But people were saying to us, “You’re doing so great. It’s clear that God is blessing you because of what you’ve done.” You, you, you. . . . I remember weeping in prayer in the shower, “God, I don’t know what they are talking about. I haven’t done a thing. I don’t feel like I’ve done anything. But if I’m doing something, PLEASE tell me because I want to keep doing it. Please! Please SHOW ME!”
And He showed me. It wasn’t me at all. It was totally Him. He was doing all the work. He had scooped us up in His arms and was carrying us all the way through. It didn’t matter if we had been kicking and screaming. God’s bigger than our big feelings. He’s not an exacting civil judge that holds back His conclusion in our favor until we walk just the right way or wear just the right thing. He’s a Daddy that sees His child with a bump on his head or an ear infection and snuggles him until he’s better in spite of the tears and irrationality. His law is love and His gospel is peace.
God can handle hard questions. God can handle the big feelings. Look at Moses, Job, Habakkuk, and Jonah. His blessing is not about us. His grace is just that — Grace.
“Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.
“God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.”
Romans 8
You may also like
6 thoughts on “Absolute Surrender or Irresistible Grace”
Comments are closed.
thank you. i find it terribly difficult to believe that i don’t “bother” God with my hurts and desires. it is amazing- His grace. now i need to pray for, to use erin’s phrase, “utter abandon”. utterly abandoned to the thought that God delights in me. it was very nice to meet you this weekend.
woo hoo camille!
Hey, thanks for the reminder that God’s grace is enough. I definitely needed to read that today. Hope all is well in SC.
Camille,
I wish I was still around at BJU to play with ideas like this in class or in the office. It might even be worth the dining common food. 🙂
Your post reminded me of George MacDonald’s short story, The Wise Woman. A selfish brat is changed into a true princess by The Wise Woman (Christ Figure). If I remember right, the change is all the Woman’s doing; never once does the child do anything or surrender or decide to be “good enough.” And at the end, she asks the Woman “How could you love such an ungrateful, selfish wretch as I?” “Because I saw all along what you were going to be,” the Woman answers.
What a thought. Not only that God’s grace is changing us without our doing or deserving anything, but that there is no point in feeling guilty about being bad, since Jesus already sees us as what we are going to be.
Zack — God’s grace is more than enough! 😀 When we realize that we join God in ministering grace to others, that whole Keswick burden is lifted.
Ah, Bard. . . . but does CHrist love us for what we’ll be, or for what we are right now? I don’t love Isaac for what he’ll be in 20 years, but for him *now*!
I’d call that a trick question, but I don’t remember you asking those. 🙂
Jesus loves us past (see Romans 5:8), present, and future. Nothing we do or don’t do can change that.