(The Worship Series, part 3)
“You’re all I want.”
“I surrender all.”
“You are my heart’s desire.”
“I give You everything.”
“Take my life, and let it be.”
“I live for You.”
Sometimes I wonder if we really mean everything we say, sing, and pray in worship―like the lines from hymns and worship songs above. I don’t know about you, but even on my best days I’m not sure I could sing such things and truly mean them. Yes, I want more of God, but I want other things too. Yes, I have surrendered to God―mostly, I think. I’m not even completely certain what that should look like on a day-to-day basis. Can you relate?
desire and surrender
There are several different sentiments expressed in worship that I wonder if we mean, such as total humility (“I am nothing”) and revolutionary revival requests (“Send down Your fire and purify Your bride”). But as I thought about this, I noticed that the main themes I wonder if we mean are pure desire and absolute surrender.
Desire and surrender. Are they connected?
Yes, they are. If you truly desire something or someone, you will give up (surrender) whatever is required in order to have that thing or person. Let me give an example. If you want to learn how to play the cello (and play it well), you will need to practice, and in order to practice, you will need to give up some free time that you could have spent doing something else. If you didn’t want to learn how to play the cello, you would be resentful that it was taking up all this time and view time spent practicing as a begrudging sacrifice. But if you really wanted to learn how to play, you wouldn’t mind much, because your desire to play the cello would eclipse your desire for that free time. That’s a small example, but the principle applies on a larger scale. Hold onto that thought, because we will return to it later.
wrestling with the divide
What makes these things so hard for us? Why are they so out of reach?
I think it’s the “absolute” part. Most of us want God to some degree. Many of us are partly surrendered to Him. But that’s not what He wants. He doesn’t want half-hearted desire and partial surrender. He doesn’t want some, He wants all―all of our desire and all of our surrender. We know that (at least we should).
We have a problem: we are divided. Our mouths sing one thing, our minds think another. God wants everything, and we hope to satisfy Him with something. We can’t honestly say that we want Him more than anything, so we aren’t sure if we are totally surrendered to Him. What are we supposed to do?
Should we replace our jubilant psalms of Davidic passion with woeful jeremiads lamenting our sad lack of it? Should we sing songs of struggle instead of songs of victory? Should we rewrite our worship songs so that they say things like “Help me to want You more than anything” or “Give me the trust I need to surrender all to You” or even “Show me what it means to be surrendered to You”?
Those lyrics don’t sound nearly as spiritual as the original versions, but maybe that’s not the point. We’re not trying to impress God and others with our worship (at least we shouldn’t be). He wants us to be honest with Him. He wants us to bring Him praise from the inside out.
Still, changing the words of the songs we sing is more of an “outside-in” reformation than an “inside-out” transformation. It deals with an outward expression but not the inner reality, which is where the divide lies. So I think that sometimes we should sing songs that convey the struggle, and sometimes we should sing the originals while inwardly praying, “Lord, this is how I want to be.” By faith. Faith is the road we must walk if we want to reach a deeper place with God. Being truthful is vital, but speaking the truth in faith is not the same as being dishonest.
delving into desire
What if our desire for God isn’t as far away as we think? It’s at the heart of every one of our other desires. David Roper writes, “Every desire, every aspiration, every hunger and thirst, every longing of our nature is nothing less than desire for God. . . .We were born for His love and we cannot live without it. He is that ‘one thing’ for which we have been looking all our lives. All that we desire is there, and infinitely more.”1
Remember what I said earlier about the interconnectedness of desire and surrender? If we recognize that our desire for God is our deepest desire at the core of all our other desires, then what we need to do is turn those lesser desires in the right direction. We must surrender them and let them be swallowed up by our greatest desire. It’s not that we don’t want other things anymore, it’s just that we want God more. In all of those things we are seeking Him. His invitation for us to seek Him and love Him more than anyone or anything is a call for our deepest desire to be met in its source, the only place where it can truly be satisfied.
leading into surrender
Desiring God is one way of loving Him, and to love Him is to trust Him. It’s only when we want Him, love Him, and trust Him completely that we will be able to totally surrender to Him. It’s hard to surrender to someone you don’t trust. So not being fully surrendered to God is first of all a trust issue. As Proverbs 3:5-6 (ESV) says, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.”
What does it mean to be surrendered to God? The verses above offer this answer: acknowledging Him in all our ways and following His leading. When we do this, He will straighten out our twisted paths and lead us to Himself. Our Shepherd will lead us in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. And we will want to follow Him, because His way is best. We will want to obey His commands because we know that they are given in love. We will want God Himself, so we will be willing to give up anything that blocks us from Him. Our desire for Him will lead to surrendering all else to His control.
the answer
By now you might be needing a moment to catch your breath. Wanting God more than anything else? Surrendering everything to Him? I know that’s what the Bible says, but that’s hard!
Don’t despair. There is hope! No, you can’t do this on your own. You cannot, of yourself, muster up pure desire, complete trust, and absolute surrender to God. The good news is, the answer already lies within you. God planted that desire in you and gave you the capacity to trust and surrender. The power to change is present in your life in the form of the Holy Spirit. He will grant you the desire and trust you need to surrender to Him. All you have to do is ask.
Then you will be able to sing, and really mean, these words:
All to Jesus I surrender,
Make me, Saviour, wholly Thine;
Let me feel the Holy Spirit,
Truly know that Thou art mine.
All to Jesus I surrender,
Lord, I give myself to Thee;
Fill me with Thy love and power,
Let Thy blessing fall on me.
I surrender all, I surrender all;
All to Thee, my blessed Saviour, I surrender all.
— Judson Van de Venter
- David Roper, Every Day Is a New Shade of Blue (Grand Rapids; Discovery House Publishers, 2012), 31. ↩︎
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