| February
/ March 2019 - Vol. 102
Surrendering
Your
Whole Life to Christ
.
by Kim
Smith
 Ruth, a woman who
was an ancestor of the Lord Jesus, the
great-grandmother of King David, had given up
everything. As a young girl she expected to
follow in her mother’s footsteps, to be
married and raise her children in the land of
her ancestors. Instead she married the son of
a widow, a family from another country, where
there was much famine. She grew to love this
whole family as her own. They treated her with
honor and respect. They told her about their
life in Bethlehem, their God, and their
traditions. After many years of joy, both sons
of this widow died. Now this young woman is a
widow herself. Her mother-in-law has made
plans to return to Bethlehem and urges the
young widow to return to her own family, she
is still young and can marry again. But God
has been at work in this young woman’s
heart! She gives up everything to go
with her mother-in-law, and God
provided! Her new husband was Boaz.
Their son was Obed, the father of Jesse, and
Jesse was the father of David, who became the
anointed king of Israel.
Jesus surendered his
life
Jesus, the promised heir who established
David’s throne forever, shows us how we can
share in the inheritance of his kingdom. In
John 12:24-26 Jesus states:
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a
grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies,
it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears
much fruit. He who loves his life loses
it, and he who hates his life in this world
will keep it for eternal life. If any
one serves me, he must follow me; and where I
am, there shall my servant be also; if any one
serves me, the Father will honor him.
In this passage Jesus is talking about his own
impending death on the cross for our salvation.
He surrendered his whole life – including the
decision to go to the cross – to the will of the
Father. His example shows us the way he wants us
to serve him and reign with him.
Meaning of surrender
What does it mean to surrender my whole life
to Jesus? I want to offer a brief reflection
on the key words in this beautiful
expression.
Surrender means the yielding of one’s
person, rights, and possessions to another.
Person involves more than just one’s physical
body. It includes one’s heart, mind,
spirit, emotions, thoughts, talents, and
gifts. Yield means to give way before
a force or power that one can no longer
resist. If someone placed a bowl of chocolate
candy in front of me, I would have to make a
choice. I couldn’t just ignore it or wish it
would go away. I would have to take action and
make a decision, a choice – whether to eat it
or put it away.
When I talk about my life, I’m
talking about something that I possess. It
belongs to me. To surrender my whole life to
the Lord is a decision that only I can make.
No one else can make that decision for me.
Many Christians have made a concrete decision
to open their hearts to Jesus and to say “yes”
to his will. Many have opened their lives to
receive the gift of being baptized in the Holy
Spirit. These are actions and choices one can
make to follow the Lord as his disciple.
The road to holiness
If we are following the Lord Jesus then we are
all on the same journey. We’re all on the same
road to holiness of life. We’re all aiming for
eternal life in heaven with the Lord God
Almighty. But each of us will encounter
different challenges and trials along the
way. We each may stumble over different
rocks and get stuck in different dead ends. We
can encourage each other. We can walk
beside each other. We can hold each other’s
hands, but the decision to move forward, be it
one step at a time or to run, is ultimately
your own decision.
The life I am offering to Jesus
includes the very state of my being alive -
breathing, sleeping, waking, every moment from
birth to death. Life is an outright gift –
from the day I was conceived and came from the
womb, up to this very present moment. What I
have lived up to this present is now past. I
can’t return to the past, but I can choose how
I will live my life today, tomorrow, and the
next day. And this includes my good and bad
days, healthy and sick ones. I believe that
regardless of our present circumstances and
state of life – whether single, married,
widowed, with our without children, young or
not so young, tall or short, a long time
Christian or a new babe in Christ – the Lord
Jesus wants each of us to surrender to him our
very lives. Any of us at any moment could find
ourselves called by God to “give up
everything” just like Ruth did when she was
called to leave her home and land to follow
the Lord.
My whole life for Christ
Christ wants my whole life and not
just one part, or even most of it. Whole means
complete, total, full, all, entire. I have
left the word whole for last because I
believe that it’s the key to discovering the
abundant life and fruitfulness which Christ
wants for each of us. I know that Christ wants
nothing less than the surrender of my whole
life to him. I think that this is often the
biggest stumbling block for many disciples who
want to follow Jesus. We might be willing to
give some parts of our lives to the Lord. But
to give all?
“Lord, I am still young. What will happen if
I give all my life to you?”
“Lord, my life is almost over. What
more do I have to give?”
“Lord, I already have my life planned out…”
“Oh, that’s right. My life – all of my life –
is from you, Lord. You created me – all of me.
In fact, you created me in your image and I am
a new creation through Jesus.”
In 2 Corinthians 12:9 the Apostle Paul says,
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power
is made perfect in weakness.”
I know from experience that it is easier for
me to surrender the big things than the little
things. Big ones, yes. I had occasion to
surrender into the Lord’s hands my
14-month-old son who was severely burned and
hospitalized for 5 days. I had to surrender
into the Lord’s hands my husband when he had a
heart attack. I surrendered into the Lord’s
hands my 22-year-old son when he got in his
van and drove some 3,000 miles across the
United States. I had no way to contact him. He
was gone for 9 months. I surrendered my
daughter into the Lord’s hands when she
decided to travel on her own to Bolivia, Costa
Rica, Nicaragua and who knows where
else.
It was easier, somehow, for me to place the
really big things into the Lord’s hands
because I knew there was nothing I could do to
control the circumstances and outcome. But it
hasn’t been so easy to let go of the things
that I think I can control. I know
that worrying accomplishes nothing. One
of my relatives worries for a hobby.
I’ve prayed, “Lord, please don’t let me be a
worrier.” But I know that God wants me to hold
nothing back from him, not even the things
that I think I can control and handle by
myself.
“I can do this. I can take care of that. This
is no problem.” Those are the things that I
have a hard time giving to the Lord.
Time and time again the Lord has taught me to
surrender to him both the big and all the
little things in my life because his grace is
sufficient for me.
This article was first published
in the November 2010 Issue of Living
Bulwark
|
“The Lord is good to those
whose hope is in him”
–
Lamentations 3:25
Forward:
In the autumn of 2009, my mother
gave a brief sharing at the Work of
Christ Women's Conference about how the
Lord had spoken to her through his word
in scripture and through the talk she
gave a year earlier on “Surrendering
your whole life to Christ” during her
battle with cancer.
In March
of this year, I watched my mom “remain
faithful unto death.” My mom and dad’s
faith during her final days taught me
more than any talk ever could. Her
example and her words below continue to
inspire me to surrender my whole life to
the Lord and to cling to scripture in
every battle that I face.
- Stacey
Smith
A personal sharing given
by Kim in the autumn of 2009
About a year
ago I went to the hospital for my
mammogram. I already knew there was a lump
and I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I
had surgery and when I came out of surgery
the hospital staff said, “We got it all –
no problem.”
I went back
a week later for a checkup and they said
“Well, those tests we do are 97% accurate.
But you fall in the 3%.” So now I
was bumped into “Stage 2” which meant I
needed chemo treatment. I knew then that I
needed a verse from scripture for
spiritual support. So I went to the
Bible. And I want you to know that
cancer is not in the Bible! But God
said “I have a scripture for you.”
He gave me Lamentations 3: 22-26.
“Because of
the Lord’s great love, we are not
consumed. For his compassions never
fail. They are new every
morning. Great is your
faithfulness. I say to myself ‘the
Lord is my portion.’ Therefore I
will wait for him. The Lord is good to
those whose hope is in him, to the one who
seeks him. It is good to wait quietly for
the salvation of the Lord.”
All
throughout this period, various lines in
this verse came to my attention and gave
me strength. I had to spend a lot of
time waiting for results between various
tests and doctor’s appointments. The
Lord reminded me that he was actively
working with me during that time, and what
he wanted me to do was patiently wait on
him and trust in his work.
When I got
the news that I needed chemo, it thought
to myself, “Lord, what do I have left to
hope in?” Before surgery I had had
hope that maybe things would change. Maybe
the Lord would heal me before the
surgery. Maybe it would just be
minor surgery, not major. After
surgery the hospital staff said, “Ok,
everything’s fine.” But then a
little bit later I got another diagnosis
which showed that I needed chemo. Again I
had thought to myself, “What do I have to
hope in?” And the Lord reminded me again
of his word in scripture – “my hope is in
him.” I then realized that the Lord was
not asking me to put my hope in the things
that I wanted to see changed. The
Lord wanted my hope to be in him.
I had a pack
of scripture cards which some people had
sent me. I wrote a number of verses out on
3x5 cards. Then I would pray these verses
out loud every day during my prayer time.
I took the notes from the talk which I
gave last year about “surrendering your
whole life to Christ” and at the end of my
prayer time I wholly surrendered the big
things that I could do nothing about to
the Lord and the little things that I
thought I had control in, but really
didn’t. I surrendered each of them
whole-heartedly to the Lord every
day. So I wrote out another 3x5
card: “My hope is in You, Lord God
Almighty,” and I said that with my other
daily scripture verses.
These verses
from scripture carried me through the
whole time of my chemo treatments.
Right now everything is fine, all my tests
are fine at least at the moment.
When I first got the diagnosis I said
“What can I do? I would like to be doing
something.” The doctor said, “Eat
well. Continue to exercise and have a
positive outlook.” I took that
positive outlook and I said “That is what
I’m going to do.” I’m not going to
get into the negatives. I’m not even
going to say, “Why, God?” I’m just
going to move on and say “Lord, put
positive things in my life.”
Kim and Mark
Smith, her husband of 34 years, raised
five children. They joined the Work of
Christ community in Lansing, Michigan, USA
in 1976. Kim served as a senior woman
leader in the Work of Christ for many
years until she passed away in March,
2010.
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