Day11: The Heart of Worship

 The Heart of Worship

Give yourselves to God.... 

Surrender your whole being to him 

to be used for righteous purposes.

Romans 6:13 (TEV)

The heart of worship is surrender.

Surrender is an unpopular word, disliked almost as much as the

word submission. It implies losing, and no one wants to be a loser.

Surrender evokes the unpleasant images of admitting defeat in

battle, forfeiting a game, or yielding to a stronger opponent. The

word is almost always used in a negative context. Captured

criminals surrender to authorities.

In today’s competitive culture we are taught to never give up

and never give in—so we don’t hear much about surrendering. If

winning is everything, surrendering is unthinkable. We would

rather talk about winning, succeeding, overcoming, and

conquering than yielding, submitting, obeying, and surrendering.

But surrendering to God is the heart of worship. It is the natural

response to God’s amazing love and mercy. We give ourselves to

him, not out of fear or duty, but in love, “because he first loved us.” 1

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After spending eleven chapters of the book of Romans

explaining God’s incredible grace to us, Paul urges us to fully

surrender our lives to God in worship: “So then, my friends,

because of God’s great mercy to us . . . offer yourselves as a living

sacrifice to God, dedicated to his service and pleasing to him. This 

is the true worship that you should offer.” 2

True worship—bringing God pleasure—happens when you

give yourself completely to God. Notice the first and last words of

that verse are the same: offer. 

Offering yourself to God is what worship is all about. 

This act of personal surrender is called many things: consecration,

making Jesus your Lord, taking up your cross, dying to self,

yielding to the Spirit. What matters

is that you do it, not what you call it.

God wants your life—all of it.

Ninety-five percent is not enough.

There are three barriers that

block our total surrender to God:

fear, pride, and confusion. We don’t

realize how much God loves us, we want to control our own lives,

and we misunderstand the meaning of surrender.

Can I trust God? Trust is an essential ingredient to surrender.

You won’t surrender to God unless you trust him, but you can’t

trust him until you know him better. Fear keeps us from

surrendering, but love casts out all fear. The more you realize how

much God loves you, the easier surrender becomes.

How do you know God loves you? He gives you many

evidences: God says he loves you;3 you’re never out of his sight;4

he cares about every detail of your life;5 he gave you the capacity

to enjoy all kinds of pleasure;6 he has good plans for your life;7 he

forgives you;8 and he is lovingly patient with you.9 God loves you

infinitely more than you can imagine. 

The greatest expression of this is the sacrifice of God’s Son for

you. “God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners

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Offering yourself to God is 

what worship is all about.  

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Christ died for us.” 10 If you want to know how much you matter to

God, look at Christ with his arms outstretched on the cross, saying,

“I love you this much! I’d rather die than live without you.”

God is not a cruel slave driver or a bully who uses brute force

to coerce us into submission. He doesn’t try to break our will,

but woos us to himself so that we might offer ourselves freely to

him. God is a lover and a liberator, and surrendering to him

brings freedom, not bondage. When we completely surrender

ourselves to Jesus, we discover that he is not a tyrant, but a savior;

not a boss, but a brother; not a dictator, but a friend.

Admitting our limitations. A second barrier to total

surrender is our pride. We don’t want to admit that we’re just

creatures and not in charge of everything. It is the oldest

temptation: “You’ll be like God!” 11 That desire—to have complete

control—is the cause of so much stress in our lives. Life is a

struggle, but what most people don’t realize is that our struggle,

like Jacob’s, is really a struggle with God! We want to be God,

and there’s no way we are going to win that struggle. 

A. W. Tozer said, “The reason why many are still troubled, still

seeking, still making little forward progress is because they

haven’t yet come to the end of themselves. We’re still

trying to give orders, and interfering with God’s

work within us.” 

We aren’t God and never will be. We are humans.

It is when we try to be God that we end up most like

Satan, who desired the same thing. 

We accept our humanity intellectually, but not

emotionally. When faced with our own limitations,

we react with irritation, anger, and resentment. We want to be

taller (or shorter), smarter, stronger, more talented, more

beautiful, and wealthier. We want to have it all and do it all, and

we become upset when it doesn’t happen. Then when we notice

that God gave others characteristics we don’t have, we respond

with envy, jealousy, and self-pity.

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DAY TEN:

THE

HEART

OF

WORSHIP

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What it means to surrender. Surrendering to God is not

passive resignation, fatalism, or an excuse for laziness. It is not

accepting the status quo. It may mean the exact opposite:

sacrificing your life or suffering in order to change what needs to

be changed. God often calls surrendered people to do battle on

his behalf. Surrendering is not for cowards or doormats.

Likewise, it does not mean giving up rational

thinking. God would not waste the mind he gave

you! God does not want robots to serve him.

Surrendering is not repressing your personality.

God wants to use your unique personality. Rather

than its being diminished, surrendering

enhances it. C. S. Lewis observed, “The more

we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we

become—because he made us. He invented all the different

people that you and I were intended to be. . . . It is when I turn to

Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin

to have a real personality of my own.”

Surrendering is best demonstrated in obedience. You say “yes,

Lord” to whatever he asks of you. To say “no, Lord” is to speak a

contradiction. You can’t call Jesus your Lord when you refuse to

obey him. After a night of failed fishing, Simon modeled surrender

when Jesus told him to try again: “Master, we’ve worked hard all

night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let

down the nets.” 12 Surrendered people obey God’s word, even if it

doesn’t make sense.

Another aspect of a fully surrendered life is trust. Abraham

followed God’s leading without knowing where it would take him.

Hannah waited for God’s perfect timing without knowing when.

Mary expected a miracle without knowing how. Joseph trusted

God’s purpose without knowing why circumstances happened the

way they did. Each of these people were fully surrendered to God. 

You know you’re surrendered to God when you rely on God to

work things out instead of trying to manipulate others, force your

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agenda, and control the situation. You let go and let God work.

You don’t have to always be “in charge.” The Bible says,

“Surrender yourself to the Lord, and wait patiently for him.” 13

Instead of trying harder, you trust more. You also know you’re

surrendered when you don’t react to criticism and rush to defend

yourself. Surrendered hearts show up best in relationships. You

don’t edge others out, you don’t demand your rights, and you

aren’t self-serving when you’re surrendered.

The most difficult area to surrender for many people is their

money. Many have thought, “I want to live for God but I also

want to earn enough money to live comfortably and retire

someday.” Retirement is not the goal of a surrendered life,

because it competes with God for the primary attention of our

lives. Jesus said, “You cannot serve both God and money” 14 and

“Wherever your treasure is, your heart will be also.” 15

The supreme example of self-surrender is Jesus. The night

before his crucifixion Jesus surrendered himself to God’s plan. He

prayed, “Father, everything is possible

for you. Please take this cup of

suffering away from me. Yet I want

your will, not mine.” 16

Jesus didn’t pray, “God, if you’re

able to take away this pain, please

do so.” He had already affirmed

that God can do anything! Instead he prayed, “God, if it is in your

best interest to remove this suffering, please do so. But if it fulfills

your purpose, that’s what I want, too.” 

Genuine surrender says, “Father, if this problem, pain, sickness,

or circumstance is needed to fulfill your purpose and glory in my

life or in another’s, please don’t take it away.” This level of

maturity does not come easy. In Jesus’ case, he agonized so much

over God’s plan that he sweat drops of blood. Surrender is hard

work. In our case, it is intense warfare against our self-centered

nature. 

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Surrender is best demonstrated

in obedience and trust. 

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The blessing of surrender. The Bible is crystal clear about

how you benefit when you fully surrender your life to God. First,

you experience peace: “Stop quarreling with God! If you agree with

him, you will have peace at last, and things will go well for you.” 17

Next, you experience freedom: “Offer yourselves to the ways of God

and the freedom never quits. . . . [his] commands set you free to live

openly in his freedom!” 18 Third, you experience God’s power in

your life. Stubborn temptations and overwhelming problems can

be defeated by Christ when given to him.

As Joshua approached the biggest battle of his life,19 he

encountered God, fell in worship before him, and surrendered his

plans. That surrender led to a stunning victory at Jericho. This is

the paradox: Victory comes through surrender. Surrender doesn’t

weaken you; it strengthens you. Surrendered to God, you don’t

have to fear or surrender to anything else. William Booth,

founder of the Salvation Army, said, “The greatness of a man’s

power is in the measure of his surrender.”

Surrendered people are the ones God uses. God chose Mary to

be the mother of Jesus, not because she was talented or wealthy

or beautiful, but because she was totally surrendered to him.

When the angel explained God’s improbable plan, she calmly

responded, “I am the Lord’s servant, and I am willing to accept

whatever he wants.” 20 Nothing is more powerful than a

surrendered life in the hands of God. “So give yourselves completely

to God.” 21

The best way to live. Everybody eventually surrenders to

something or someone. If not to God, you will surrender to the

opinions or expectations of others, to money, to resentment, to

fear, or to your own pride, lusts, or ego. You were designed to

worship God—and if you fail to worship him, you will create

other things (idols) to give your life to. You are free to choose

what you surrender to, but you are not free from the

consequences of that choice. E. Stanley Jones said, “If you don’t

surrender to Christ, you surrender to chaos.”

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Surrender is not the best way to live; it is the only way to live.

Nothing else works. All other approaches lead to frustration,

disappointment, and self-destruction. The King James Version calls

surrender “your reasonable

service.”22 Another version translates

it “the most sensible way to serve

God.”23 Surrendering your life is not

a foolish emotional impulse but a

rational, intelligent act, the most

responsible and sensible thing you

can do with your life. That is why

Paul said, “So we make it our goal to please him.” 24 Your wisest

moments will be those when you say yes to God.

Sometimes it takes years, but eventually you discover that the

greatest hindrance to God’s blessing in your life is not others, it is

yourself—your self-will, stubborn pride, and personal ambition.

You cannot fulfill God’s purposes for your life while focusing on

your own plans. 

If God is going to do his deepest work in you, it will begin with

this. So give it all to God: your past regrets, your present problems,

your future ambitions, your fears, dreams, weaknesses, habits, hurts,

and hang-ups. Put Jesus Christ in the driver’s seat of your life and

take your hands off the steering wheel. Don’t be afraid; nothing

under his control can ever be out of control. Mastered by Christ,

you can handle anything. You will be like Paul: “I am ready for

anything and equal to anything through Him who infuses inner

strength into me, that is, I am self-sufficient in Christ’s sufficiency.” 25

Paul’s moment of surrender occurred on the Damascus road

after he was knocked down by a blinding light. For others, God

gets our attention with less drastic methods. Regardless,

surrendering is never just a one-time event. Paul said, “I die

daily.”26 There is a moment of surrender, and there is the practice

of surrender, which is moment-by-moment and lifelong. The

problem with a living sacrifice is that it can crawl off the altar, so

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Surrender is not the best way 

to live; it is the only way to live.

Nothing else works.

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you may have to resurrender your life fifty times a day. You must

make it a daily habit. Jesus said, “If people want to follow me, they

must give up the things they want. They must be willing to give up

their lives daily to follow me.” 27

Let me warn you: When you decide to live a totally

surrendered life, that decision will be tested. Sometimes it will

mean doing inconvenient, unpopular, costly, or seemingly

impossible tasks. It will often mean doing the opposite of what

you feel like doing. 

One of the great Christian leaders of the twentieth century was Bill

Bright, the founder of Campus Crusade for Christ. Through Crusade

staff around the world, the Four Spiritual Laws tract, and the Jesus

film (seen by over four billion people), more than 150 million people

have come to Christ and will spend eternity in heaven. 

I once asked Bill, “Why did God use and bless your life so

much?” He said, “When I was a young man, I made a contract with

God. I literally wrote it out and signed my name at the bottom. It

said, ‘From this day forward, I am a slave of Jesus Christ.’”

Have you ever signed a contract like that with God? Or are you

still arguing and struggling with God over his right to do with

your life as he pleases? Now is your time to surrender—to God’s

grace, love, and wisdom.

Day Ten

Thinking about My Purpose

Point to Ponder: The heart of worship is surrender.

Verse to Remember: “Surrender your whole being to

him to be used for righteous purposes.”

Romans 6:13b (TEV)

Question to Consider: What area of my life am I

holding back from God?

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