Surrendering to Change
by Jared Johnson
Does surrender seem like a dirty word? The “Sunday School answer” is an obvious “no.” But when I hear about preachers dismissed because they won’t talk about ____ in forceful-enough terms for the likings of a couple elders, it seems like such a situation could use a little more surrender. When I see tweets ranting at one person or thought or another, it’d probably be better for all concerned if there was a little more surrender at play in those interactions.
One specific idea has been confronting me over and over in situation after situation for a couple years now. As I see and hear of people leaving churches for other churches so frequently, surrender is not often evident.
My home church had one preacher for decades. That changed a few years ago, and there has been a lot of dislocation in the wake of that change; relational, functional and so on, and people feel it. “I’m just not being fed.” “It’s so different from when ___ was the minister.” “I miss that we don’t ___ as a church anymore.” “I feel like I don’t really have a church home now.” While I want to sympathize, maybe the 1st-person pronoun-ing is a bit thick?
At e2, we point church leaders to 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1 and 1 Peter 5 pretty often since they deal so overtly with “eldering.” But a few years ago, I was stopped short as I listened through the book of Titus in a Bible-in-a-year plan. The sheer quantity of instruction, command and directive that Paul gives Titus should get our attention. Over and again, Paul has to tell Titus “do this; avoid that; speak up about…” I don’t know Greek, but in English, there are almost two dozen commands Paul gives Titus in the short letter. Yet, 2 Corinthians 12.18 says that Paul and Titus “have the same spirit and walk in each other’s steps, doing things the same way.”
So was Paul lying in 2 Corinthians 12 or did he misspeak in Titus? Neither of those can be true, so there is only 1 other option: we have to adjust our idea of “doing things the same way.” Maybe in “doing things the same way” we should emphasize the Kingdom work of the Spirit, rather than the minor personality quirks of a human?
The Father’s Kingdom is unfathomable to us; only He knows its extent, ultimate effects, and so on. If His Kingdom is wide enough that the church down the street can also accomplish His purposes and not just “my” church, then is His Kingdom also deep enough that I can stay with the same spiritual family through seasons of change and still participate in His work? I think so.
I remind myself to let go of certain things that were “autopilot” in years past and surrender to the work God is doing around me, probably even in spite of me! His Kingdom will advance – forcefully! (Matt 11.12) – and that’s not up to me. I don’t need to explain nor rationalize to myself or anyone else why this guy did it this way but the former guy did it that way. That’s not up to me. I don’t need to know why some staffer’s title changed. That’s not up to me.
Just today, I saw a tweet from a preacher referencing the late Eugene Peterson: “On how to find a church: ‘Pick one and stay.’”
The Father will accomplish His purposes, with or without me. They are being accomplished every day in billions of ways completely unknown to me. It’s not up to me. I simply need to surrender.
