Submission
Passage
In this Journal I want to set some foundation around the term and act of Submission. In our culture today the word submit has a nasty connotation. You may even have some bad experiences with submitting to someone. However, for the believer, submission is the most freeing and peace-producing act we have towards God. By the end of this journal my goal is to show you the peace that comes from submitting to God.
Submission to God takes on four forms or sometimes stages depending on your path with God. The four forms are:
Combat With the Devil and Sin
Love for Christ
Choosing God Over Man
Submission Without Understanding
Combat With the Devil and Sin
James 4:7 - ESV
7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Starting with form or stage 1, we see that sin is always ready to act in us throughout our lives as Christians. As we mature in Christ we practice being in constant submission to God which causes sin to be less often and less dramatic, but it never fully stops. Sin is especially frequent and devastating when you are a new believer. In every moment that sin is a part of our lives we must submit to God and ask for forgiveness. We may feel like we need to "get things together" before coming to God but the reality is that God is the one who puts us together. The sooner we submit to him the sooner he can begin to work in us. The faster we can do this after sin the less impact sin will have on us and the more we will develop a love and appreciation for Christ.
Love for Christ
John 14:15 - ESV
15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
Let's move on to the next form of submission. As we love Christ more and more we want to show him that love. We want to worship him for what he has done and that worship takes on many forms. Sometimes worship is singing a song that thanks him and glorifies him. Other times it is keeping his commands as he calls us to do in this verse. That love for Christ is what helps us to keep his commands even when the world and other people try to keep us from doing that.
Choosing God Over Man
Acts 5:29 - ESV
29 But Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.
The next form of submission can be the most difficult because it can have the most immediate consequences from the world. Often in life you will face opposition from people who do not know God. These people will not understand the phrase "I must obey God rather than man." To them it will seem like nonsense to submit to God. Be strengthened by your love for God to stand strong against man.
Matthew 10:28 - ESV
28 And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
While love for God helps us to submit to him over man it is also helpful to remember that in the end what God can control is more powerful than any man. The worst thing that can happen if you do not obey man is that he kills you. While that is pretty bad, remember, God can send you to hell for eternity.
While Matthew 10:28 encourages a righteous fear of God because of what he can do to us, I have found it helpful to see this verse from a different perspective. I see it in combination with Romans 8:31.
Romans 8:31 - ESV
31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
When I see the power that God has in Matthew 10:28 and combine that with the peace of knowing that same God is for me in Romans 8:31 I can stand strong against any opposition knowing God is in front of me.
Submission Without Understanding
Job 1:21 - ESV
21 And he said, “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.”
The last and most peace-producing stage of submission is submitting when you do not understand or know what God is doing. Job in the verse above is a perfect example of submitting to God when you do not understand what he is doing.
Satan challenged Job's faithfulness to God and put him through a series of hardships to test his faith in God. Job lost all his wealth, his children, and even his health by the time his hardships ended. It got so bad that his wife said, "Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die." (Job 2:9) Job had every external reason to turn away from God. Instead he says, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD". In essence, "I came into this world with nothing and I will leave it with nothing. Everything I had God gave and then he took it away. God is good." What tremendous faith he had in God to be able to submit to his plan with no understanding of why these things were happening to him.
In the end God gave Job back more than what he had lost.
The Narrow Way
The life a believer is constant submission to the will of God. While that seems scary and foreign to us today, it is necessary. Not only is it necessary, but when you actually do it, you will find peace you have never felt before. Challenges you once faced on your own and failed, you will now face them with and for God and you will not fail because God will work through you. Submission to God is the ultimate form of "letting go" and once you let go and give your life to God he can begin to Sanctify you, leading to even more peace.
