Devotions this week based on the Message: “BELIEVE: Week 15: Total Surrender”
(NOTE: This sermon series and devotional series is based on a book by Randy Frazee entitled, “BELIEVE.”
You may choose to download or purchase the book as a supplement to your worship and devotional emails.)
Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
This passage is a great way to wrap up the week and captures the essence of what “Total Surrender” looks like.
“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.”
In order to follow Jesus, the sinful nature inside each one of us must be daily crucified, i.e. put to death. Martin Luther as he explained the blessing of baptism put it this way:
What does such baptizing with water indicate?
It indicates that the Old Adam in us should by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.
Where is this written?
St. Paul writes in Romans chapter six: “We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.” (Rom. 6:4)
Often we start our days without a thought as to how will we approach the day ahead. Will today be a day I allow my sinful nature to make the decisions and chart the direction? Or will today be a day where the Spirit of God guides my decisions and charts my direction? Will today be one where I live to receive glory or give glory?
It’s tough, but here is the practical value of daily remembering our baptism. Our baptism personally connected us to the crucifixion of Jesus and his resurrection. As you take a shower/bath today, let the water that washes the dirt off your body remind you of the waters of baptism that washed sin from your soul. The only way to live “totally surrendered” is in the reality that you are a redeemed child of God.
“The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
Life takes on a new focus and perspective when it intersects with the cross. The cross reminds me of the total sacrifice that Jesus made for me! The cross screams the reality of God’s love for me! What else would drive Jesus to suffer and die for me? Nothing but his love for me.
When you consider how you will live your life and for whom you will live your life consider this. If your motivation for living is some earthly reward and your life’s focus is to live for a human being, life will always be empty. Earthly things will go away and the use of them stops at the grave. Although you live to serve others, if the only motivation for your living is how someone else reacts, it will be challenging. God lays out the value of Total surrender. We live under the ONE who loves us unconditionally and spend a life serving the ONE who gave himself for me. And one day we will enjoy the presence of the Son of God.
When God’s Spirit plants the proper perspective in my heart, total surrender is not something done from a place of coercion or pressure, but from a heart that has been deeply touched by the one who “loved me and GAVE himself FOR ME!”
Enjoy a life of total surrender to the one who totally sacrificed himself to you!
Apply: What does it take for you (mentally, spiritually, emotionally) to be a person who is completely surrendered to God’s purposes?
Prayer: Lord, help us always live in view of your mercy, in the shadow of your cross, and with the full assurance that you love us and gave yourself for us. Only with this perspective will I be able to live a life of total surrender to you. AMEN.