Over And Over!

Matthew 10:³⁹ “If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.”

We will kick off today’s devotional with our final thought yesterday. Surrender is not a one-time event. You have to daily, consistently take up your cross and follow Jesus. Will you stumble along the way? Yes, as day follows night you will. Get up and keep following Jesus. Take up that cross of choice, of decision, and keep following your Maker. The truth is nobody really has control. Control is like a drug that gives you a false high. But leaves you with a bad hangover that hurts you and your loved ones. So, it is a choice. Do you want an illusion of control, or do you want the freedom of surrender? What is it going to be?

Check out Mary’s response again Luke 1:³⁸ “Mary responded, “I am the Lord’s servant. May everything you have said about me come true.” (NIV, emphasis added). This is someone who had her own dreams and her own future plans. Most young girls, even from age ten, have started to picture how their own wedding day would be, the dress they want to wear, and everything. And that dream was ‘shattered’. You may be looking at your child and thinking he or she is just ten years old. But many of them have a plan. And this was Mary in her early teenage years laying down her plans and saying, “I am the Lord’s servant’…”. At this point, she was Mary the young girl, not Mary the woman. Yet she said, “… May everything you have said about me come true.”

You would think the surrender would end here, right? All through her life, Mary had to surrender. From being pregnant, she had to go home for a census with Joseph. Remember, they were not yet married. But she had to surrender her reputation. She had to surrender even her physical condition. Once she gave birth to the baby, they had to go to Egypt. She had to surrender in exile. As Jesus was growing, it was an issue because I imagine other children would be picking on Jesus. And perhaps Jesus would go home like any normal child and complain to his mother. Mary had to surrender to God, and she kept these things in her heart.

When Jesus was twelve years old, about the same age when Mary made the decision to allow God to take full control of her life, Jesus was missing. Imagine what Mary felt. But she had to let go, in her heart, and cede control to God. Imagine, when Jesus was on the cross, Mary looked at her first son on the cross but had to let go and let Him fulfil His destiny. Jesus, in the Garden of Gethsemane, used the same Greek expression that Mary used when He said, “Not my will but Your will be done in.” Jesus does what He asks us to do. Jesus surrendered.

Prayer: Father, teach me to surrender like Jesus, to let go, and let it be, in Jesus Name. Amen!