I surrender all. A simple statement- three words- but what does it mean? Do we ever really think about what we are saying when we pronounce these words? I grew up saying them, but I never really sat down and thought through all that they entailed. Different influences in my life growing up attempted to define this phrase for me, but I subconsciously pushed such definitions aside and shoved them into the back of my brain.
Total surrender. If anyone is truly honest with them self, this is not a very appealing idea. We sing happy tunes in church on Sunday about surrendering our entire lives to Christ, but surrender, for the humans self, is not a happy or joyous event. It means death. Death to desires, to hopes, dreams, wishes, cravings, It means putting ourselves in prison- forgoing all of our rights. It means becoming a slave to Someone who is completely opposite of what we are in every way.
I don’t know about most people, but I certainly have never longed to be put into jail. I have never yearned to subjugate myself to a lifetime of hard work that does not pay or benefit myself. If you don’t relish these ideas, surrender is not your deck of cards, for surrender is so much more than imprisonment and enslavement and death.
Surrender is a total submission to the will and desires of another. A slave can still defy his master, but one who is completely surrendered lives to serve and please and obey his master. Death may still overcome you so that you must give in to it in the end, but you may still fight till the last. Likewise, a prisoner may try to escape rather than accepting his due punishment, but one who truly surrenders will submit meekly, knowing that he deserves to pay the penalty.
Naturally, no one is going to humbly submit to imprisonment for sin. Everyone accused of doing wrong, even if they know they are guilty, will take their case to court and try to get off with a lighter punishment. Hardly anyone hates life so much that, put in a desperate situation, they will quickly give up all hope and take their own lines away, submitting to the rule of death. No slave, given the opportunity, would remain in servitude when offered a chance at freedom and escape from bondage. All of these things are exactly what we are saying we will do when we proclaim loudly for all to hear: “I surrender all.”
We are placing ourselves in prison and humbly, quietly, brokenly taking on the just penalty for our sins. We are willing taking on a lifelong enslavement to the strictest, most exacting of Masters, but a Master who carries our burden for us, whose “yoke is easy and burden is light.” We are embracing death daily, killing ourselves and our desires to make room for our Master.
Are you so eager now to sing for all to hear “Jesus, I surrender all”? I think that it is important to take a moment to stop and really think through what those seemingly simple words really mean. For too long I pushed this reality “out of sight, out of mind,” but when it all boils down, you cannot escape the reality that one day all must face: Either you surrender you entire life to Christ, OR you surrender it to yourself and thereby to sin and wickedness. There is no straddling the fence- either you fully belong to Christ or totally to the power of sin. I have lived a large part of my own life trying to please both God and my own desires, but in the end these endeavors lead only to one or to the other- never do these two paths cross. Next time you begin to sing or pray “I surrender all,” decided to get off the fence and pick a side- choose death, choose imprisonment, choose servitude, and in the end you choose life.
