Surrender

Luke 1:26-38

How many of us can surrender like Mary? She says, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord." Most every story of call in the Bible involves this moment of surrender. In the Old Testament we see it with Abraham who ends up getting discouraged and wanting to control things so we end up with another child and a fight between wives. Jacob has to surrender all his lying, cheating, conniving ways in order to come back home and settle things once and for all between he and his brother. Moses has to be convinced he isn't inept and can actually lead the people out of Egypt before he accepts the call for him and his brother, Aaron.

Here though Mary presents no excuses, she doesn't plan out how to steal God's favor, she doesn't get discouraged and give up on it all in the face of even jeopardizing her very life. She accepts what God has said. She accepts this call to carry this child, to have this big change in her life. How many of us would truly do this? Surrender means not struggling with what change is presented to us, surrender means our ideas are not the most important, surrender means we let God be active and we participate in where God is directing us.

Now most times people want to own the call. They want to make sure they receive the recognition they deserve, they want to know what is going to happen next, yet there is none of this assurance when we flow with the Spirit as a call from God. We have to be willing to say, "here am I" without question, without assurance, without the safety net to catch us. It means we sometimes fail, yet it always means we try.

So what we must ask ourselves is where is God calling us and are we answering the call? Are we too afraid to answer, do we want assurances, what does it mean to truly trust? All the Old Testament stories teach us what it is to struggle with God's call. Mary teaches us to fall, to ponder, to be perplexed and to still surrender. Life itself is a series of surrendering to something bigger than ourselves. We only need to fall, to risk failing, to ponder when we do, and to pick up and go on trusting, we never see the whole picture, just a part.


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