Submission

We want to be in control! It’s one of the fiercest temptations in daily life. We want to control our lives, the lives of our children, the outcome at work, our marriages, our health; we even want to control God.

We worry and fret over how we can produce a favorable future. We plan for things that never happen! We manipulate and try to arrange things for our benefit. Fear grips us.

When we don’t get our way, and we lose control, we can “throw a fit,” even as adults. We can pout with the best of them! We can make life miserable for those around us.

No matter the scenario of your life or the circumstances you are under or the result you wish to achieve, here’s the answer to it all, all the time . . . Submit yourselves therefore to God (James 4:7).

Submission is the opposite of control and the antithesis of how we sadly and usually live our lives.

Submission is living the Christ-life. He submitted completely to his Father’s will (Matthew 26:39). You can trust God with your life (Psalm 16:11; 18:30; 23:1-6; Proverbs 3:5-7). God is sovereign, omniscient, omnipotent, and transcendent over time, events, life, people, and even the weather.

I am so grateful for my dad who enabled me to meet and be under the influence of so many individuals who had surrendered to the will of God in their lives. One such time was a Bible Conference held in western Pennsylvania at an outdoor camp meeting. Men from the States as well as Scotland came to preach God’s Word. One man in attendance sang the following song of which I have often thought about and sung. The title is simply, “Submission.” I needed this reminder again today.

1.     The path that I have trod,

Has brought me nearer God,

Though oft it led through sorrow’s gates .

Though not the way I choose,

In my way I might lose

The joy that yet for me awaits.

Not what I wish to be,

Nor where I wish to go,

For who am I that I should choose my way?

The Lord shall choose for me,

‘Tis better far, I know,

So let him bid me go, or stay

2.     The cross that I must bear,

If I a crown would wear,

Is not the cross that I should take;

But since on me ’tis laid,

I’ll take it unafraid,

And bear it for the Master’s sake.  

Not what I wish to be,

Nor where I wish to go,

For who am I that I should choose my way?

The Lord shall choose for me,

‘Tis better far, I know,

So let him bid me go, or stay.

3.    Submission to the will

Of him who guides me still

Is surety of His love revealed;

My soul shall rise above

This world in which I move,

I conquer only when I yield.

Not what I wish to be,

Nor where I wish to go,

For who am I that I should choose my way?

The Lord shall choose for me,

‘Tis better far, I know,

So let him bid me go, or stay.

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:5-8)

Who is in control of your life today?