Now, I’m not saying this was a miracle or anything, but I sure do think it was strange. I was sitting here thinking about the responses I received from yesterday’s post titled Lord, Take Control, and I decided to continue with that theme for another day or two. So I picked up the songbook thinking about the words to an old favorite, All to Jesus I Surrender, and guess where the book opened?  Yup, that’s right, I parted the covers of the song book and the song on the left hand page was…All to Jesus I Surrender. And, the song on the page facing it is, Take My Life, and Let It Be. Wow, I’ll give you two guesses what tomorrow’s song will be, and if you need both guesses you may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer. LOL   

I have sung All to Jesus, my whole life, mostly during the invitation at worship, and I think that may be a tragedy. The tragedy is that the invitation seems so formal, so desperate. It’s a time when somebody who’s done something really bad is supposed to go forward and ask for forgiveness. I remember growing up in the church of Christ, and wondering why we sang an invitation song two times every Sunday, and once on Wednesday evening, because I thought the only time a person could go forward to be baptized or confess sin in their lives was during a Gospel meeting. After all that is the only time I ever saw anyone respond to the invitation. 

I’d like to make two points based on what I just wrote. (That means this is not really official cause we all know that in order to be official there has to be three points.) Number one is; I think we should sing All to Jesus at a time other than during the invitation because during the invitation it’s easy to place the meaning of the words on the other person. Know what I mean? It’s like, I haven’t done anything dirty so I’ll sing this song hoping someone who has will get the hint and take action. All to Jesus is much to personal to place in the pass it on category. It is a statement by the individual singing the song; it’s a commitment, a personal promise between a soul and God. It’s a proclamation to God that says, I am your slave take me and use me, as you will. 

Number two, and this is chasing a rabbit, is; I think we need to realize that an invitation song shouldn’t mean we have to have done something terrible in order to ask for prayers, or renew a commitment. I will confess to you right now that I have been guilty of two very unchristian things when I’ve seen someone walking down to the front. I have been known to start playing this guessing game in my head, What did they do, cheat on their wife, are they into drugs, etc? Or, I have thought, Oh great now we’ll be late getting out of here. Brothers and sisters I need to rejoice, as the angels in heaven are doing, when someone confesses sin, or renews their commitment to God, and I think more of us should take advantage of the opportunity we have to tell other’s what’s going on in our walk of service to God. I think our culture has convinced us that we cannot show that we are not in total control of everything, and that we don’t need help from anyone. We have come to believe that we cannot show weakness and we cannot admit failure. 

All to Jesus I surrender, All to Him I freely give;

I will ever love and trust Him, In His presence daily live.

All to Jesus I surrender, Lord, I give myself to Thee;

Fill me with Thy love and power, Let Thy blessings fall on me.

I surrender all

(Words: John W. VanDeVenter

Music: Winfield S. Weeden)  

I want to leave you with something to chew on, something to think about. I believe God wants us to be “Mature Babies.” Do you understand what I’m saying? I believe God wants us to be mature in our service, faith, love, walk, commitment, etc. He wants us to fully understand through scripture, and the indwelling of the Spirit, what it means to follow Him. The amazing thing is that once we mature to that level, we will understand that in order to live, and serve, as He wants us too, we have to be babies, we have to be totally dependent on Him. 

Till next time,

Grump