Jesus Demands Your Total Surrender

I passed a church marquee this morning that read, “Jesus demands your total surrender.”

I’ve heard that all my life, but for the life of me I don’t read it in the Bible–though I realize that the Bible is not the depository of ALL wisdom and knowledge.

What I have read in the Bible that God requires of us is to “do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.”

I have been a “Christian” all of my life–seriously so–and one thing I’ve learned is that it is impossible for me to TOTALLY surrender myself to God.  No matter how hard I try there will always be some darkening corner of my being that will withhold itself–whether I realize it or not.

However, I do find it possible to do justice, to love kindness, and sometimes to walk humbly before God.

I have learned to be suspicious when someone asserts that God demands our TOTAL surrender.  People may demand that of us, but God, knowing the frailty of our frame, has never demanded that of us.  Rather, He has fulfilled that state of total surrender in his own being, that of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit–who constantly and persistently and adoringly bless and praise and adore one the other in the eternal Perichoresis.  Our loving Father draws us into that dance and does so not waiting for our total surrender, but rather loves us into His Love and woos us into His arms.