by Jan Dravecky
Psalm 36:9 After weeks in bed, incapacitated by depression, I finally made myself get up, although I was still very weak. I sat at my dining room table, sipping a cup of tea and gazing out the window at the flowers in my backyard garden. I sat there wishing life could go back to the way it used to be. The leaves on the trees were swaying in the breeze and shimmering in the sunlight. Their lovely spring green was deepening into a shade that heralds the coming of summer. I watched a sparrow hopping from branch to branch, stopping to chirp as if tuning the notes of his song. He seemed to sing a song of joy, I song I couldn't yet sing; but his bright song reminded me that joy was still alive somewhere. For that, I was grateful. At that moment, an impression came to me unbidden. It was this: All your life, Jan you have tried to remove pain and create happiness by manipulating people and circumstances. It has been like a juggling act for you. But, Jan, it is not up to you. You need to let go. If you let go, I'm going to show you a joy you've never known. I knew this came from God, not me, because it was opposed to anything I would have told myself. I kept telling myself, "Hold on, just hold on!" I didn't even know what it meant to let go! Then I recalled a passage I had underlined in Oswald Chambers devotional book My Utmost For His Highest while I was still confined to bed. I found the book and the underlined passage. It read: To become one with Jesus Christ, a person must be willing not only to give up sin, but also surrender his whole way of looking at things. Being born again by the Spirit of God means that we must first be willing to let go before we can grasp something else
. Are we willing to surrender our grasp on all that we possess, our desires, and everything else in our lives? Are we ready to be identified with the death of Jesus Christ? We will suffer a sharp and painful disillusionment before we fully surrender
If you are faced with the question of whether or not to surrender, make a determination to go through the crisis, surrendering all that you have and all that you are to him. And God will then equip you to do all He requires(1) Jan's favorite book, Let Go by Fenalon explores in greater detail the act of surrendering to God. To preview and order this book, see Outreach Resources. Adapted from A Joy I'd Never Known by Jan Dravecky with Connie Neal, pgs 121-122. (1) My Utmost for His Highest, An updated edition in Today's Language, Ed. James Reiman (Grand Rapids: Discovery House Publishers, 1992 by Oswald Chambers Publications).
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