Surrendering to Jesus/God is Not Biblical

I didn't start a discussion on spiritual surrender. Reread Message 1The most common term of the word surrender is: to yield to the power, control, or possession of another upon compulsion or demand.You've shown that religion has a specialized meaning of the word surrender: Surrender in spirituality and religion means that a believer completely gives up his own will and subjects his thoughts, ideas, and deeds to the will and teachings of a divine power or deity.That brings us to the meaning of will. Is the believer required to completely give up their own desires (will) or are they supposed to give up their power of control over their own actions or emotions (will)?To subject one's thoughts, ideas, and deeds to the will (desire/command) and teachings of a divine power or deity, one needs to understand the will (desire/command) and teachings of the divine power or deity.IMO, we are to give up desiring wrong behavior and follow the right behavior outlined by Jesus.

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Also yielding to God's(not just any better course of action) course of action is to quit doing what you want to do which is surrendering.

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Surrender today also carries the meaning of putting aside as hopeless or useless; abandon (to surrender all thought of winning).IMO though, in both those cases, the word repent would be a better choice and is in line with what Jesus taught.

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You just keep saying I'm wrong without scripture to back it.

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Concerning Matthew 16:24, in Message 32 I did give support for why I understand the comment in the text to be time specific and not intended for the general public then or today.I also gave a more current day example of denying oneself.IMO, neither is an example of giving up power or control over one's own actions or emotions.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Speaking from a personal perspective, an ideal day for me involves prayer at several levels and times. When I awaken, I acknowledge God as being alive and an integral part of my life. I pray for Him to teach me and guide me. I don't ask Him to drive the car for me. I don't ask Him to speak through me, unless there are people that I am meeting to whom I am preparing to talk to about Him.When going to work, I ask for Him to bless the workplace, to keep me humble and focused on being a representative of Him. I pray for every customer and ask Him to have me see them as He sees them and not how my own biases and stereotypes see them.Looking back on what I do, I don't think that I have surrendered my entire decision making process over to God as if I were an emotional and physical cripple. I DO ask Him to guide my conscience so that I will always act as He would have me act. This is a process that involves a type of surrender. My base impulses and emotional reactions are always under self scrutiny.

In Message 33 and in several posts including Message 1 I've agreed that Jesus asks us to repent ( to change one's mind for better). I also agree that God has made it known that he does chastise people to train them.The verses you share are not from the teachings of Jesus, but understanding that the authors aren't quoting Jesus; submitting or being subject to God isn't any closer to the general usage of the word surrender (give up control) than when I subject or submit to the governing authorities of today. I don't give up control of my life or actions. I consent to follow the rules. Which IMO, is what God and Jesus want us to do. This comment by John W. Ritenbaugh in his series on submitting makes my point better than I can. We need self-control to submit. So I don't agree that God or Jesus require people to give up control over their lives.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

I'm not avoiding you, but most of your posts tend to deal with personal situations and I hesitate to make comments on personal situations given limited information. So, for the record this is strictly my opinion.

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Looking back on what I do, I don't think that I have surrendered my entire decision making process over to God as if I were an emotional and physical cripple. I DO ask Him to guide my conscience so that I will always act as He would have me act. This is a process that involves a type of surrender. My base impulses and emotional reactions are always under self scrutiny.

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From the way you have written it, no, none of the meanings for the word surrender would be an adequate description of what you are doing.You are asking God to guide you. At some point you decide whether you want to follow that guidance or not or whether to change your way of thinking to avoid the wrong behavior again.It is similar to when an EvC member types a post and they know what they have typed is against forum guidelines, because they know the guidelines and they have been warned. Some even type an apology at the bottom of the post and still proceed to submit their reply.Until they hit the "submit reply" button, they have a chance to submit to the guidelines of the forum and edit the post to meet forum standards.As we grow spiritually we continue to edit our thinking per God's guidelines. The more we exercise our self-control by making the choice to edit, the stronger our self-control becomes. If we don't edit our thinking we will continually need to apologize for hitting the "submit reply" button and letting our self-control atrophy.IMO, this is what God asks of us and what Jesus taught for the general public.I don't consider this a form of surrender by the general usage or even the definition given us for spiritual surrender.
We are in control of our actions.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

And that is the level you are on. I thought like that. You will go to heaven or paradise for living like this. Eventually, I got to the point where I told God to take as much control of my life as he sees fit. That's what spiritual surrender is. This means no matter how much I might believe something is right; I will not listen to my self, but to what He wants for me. Put yourself under God's scrutiny which may actually be what you call self scrutiny. That little feeling that you may be doing something wrong, I believe that's God not your mind. I believe we are sometimes harder on ourselves than God is.Edited by b b, : No reason given.

As much as He sees fit?The question here is: How much control of your life does God want? Does He want to control every baby step? Or does He want us to control ourselves according to His guidelines?

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God does not possess people, in the way we may think of in relation to demonic possession.When we surrender ourselves to be used by God to accomplish His purposes on earth, we have agreed to willingly let Him guide our actions. I believe it goes beyond what we consciously do, but actually becomes God living in us and working in us. This would be perfected in a complete case of mystical union. Even so, there is no clear line between what God is doing and what we are doing. Therefore the use of the word surrender is only in the sense of a spiritual surrender to an ideal, or to the Holy Spirit's inclinings. There never was any actual, physical possibility of being controlled by God.

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Therefore the use of the word surrender is only in the sense of a spiritual surrender to an ideal, or to the Holy Spirit's inclinings. There never was any actual, physical possibility of being controlled by God.

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What you seem to be describing is what I mentioned in the OP. (Message 1) So any teachings implying the more common usage aren't really supported by God or Jesus.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Purpledawn:What is worship? Is that not akin to giving yourself over to something to it's or His honor?In addition to speaking about taxes, Jesus said in the same breath, 'Give to God, what is God's'.What is God's Purpledawn?Biblically speaking, we are God's, and we are expected to be Godly.When we are trying to be educated what do we do? We give ourselves to being educated. We surrender other interests (time, money, behavior)over to the education system or educator. We cannot benefit from them without conforming to the system to a very large degree. We play by their rules (lax or restrictive as they may be).To whom do we give ourselves to be Godly? Who can teach and lead the way to eternal righteousness? Such a reality is not exhaustable... It goes on for ever and ever.While giving myself to drugs and materialism I became empty. I found no answers. I have found the inexhaustable longing of my heart, and I am only trying to share it. I am astounded by the resistance, though I once resisted myself.I am sorry if it is offensive, but if you found it (or it found you), you would give yourself to share it also. As it stands now, you appear to give yourself to yourself, in order to protect your own turf and dreams. You have that right; to disagree and to fight for your own perceptions.Please just allow me the same right to speak what I believe to be the truth, with whatever metaphor or examples I choose to use.If I am not given the same freedom given to others, I will try not to act out as I have in the past. I am sorry if my own pride has gotten in the way of Christ, whom I surrender to more each day in order that I might prove to you that I am for real.

Sorry, I am not aware that anyone thinks of these teachings in any 'more common usage'.There is only the simple idea of surrendering to the voice of God where or however one hears it. The degree of 'control' God has is only known to the individual, I would suppose. For some it is hard to yield, for others easier.

I don't get your point, I guess. There are areas of my life which I will never willingly submit to government interference. When it comes to doing anything God says, where can one rightfully draw the line? And why would any Christian want to do so? I cannot imagine any legitimate motive which would be consistent with the bible.And I do not personally believe genuine repentance can be anything less than surrender. God judges the heart, and nothing is hidden from Him.

Concerning the topic.The plain text does not support the teaching of surrender. Yes, you can take the Trouble-in-River-City route to make it fit, but you have not shown that the plain text given the situation supports surrender. Message 147Concerning the Personal Comments

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While giving myself to drugs and materialism I became empty. I found no answers. I have found the inexhaustable longing of my heart, and I am only trying to share it. I am astounded by the resistance, though I once resisted myself.

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If that is what you want to do, then write up your belief statement and have it placed in the Columnist's Corner.Trying to evangelize in every thread is inappropriate and disruptive to discussions. This thread is not about me, it is about the teaching and whether there is support for such a teaching in the plain text reading.This thread is also not questioning God, it is questioning a common teaching of today, which is not against what Jesus taught.In case you haven't noticed, everyone participating in this thread so far, to the best of my knowledge, is a Christian. You're preaching to the choir.

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If I am not given the same freedom given to others, I will try not to act out as I have in the past. I am sorry if my own pride has gotten in the way of Christ, whom I surrender to more each day in order that I might prove to you that I am for real.

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You have the same freedom as everyone else on this board. You are also required to follow the guidelines like everyone else on the board and stick to the topic and not make it personal. You are actually asking for special treatment because you aren't strong enough to control yourself yet.Everyone's spiritual journey is different and we are all on different levels of the journey. If you are not at a point in your journey where you are comfortable examining the plain text meanings, then don't continue the discussion.Since this thread is also not about you or your testimony, I don't want to continue this line of discussion since it is off topic for this thread. If you want to discuss your personal beliefs, then propose a thread for the Columnist's Corner.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Does Jesus teach us detachment concerning material things? Does He teach us not to cling to family over Him?Does He teach us to seek His will?Does He teach us that he who loses his life will find it?The use of the word surrender, in even the most dogmatic Catholic tradition, is completely in line with the Bible IMO. Perhaps you find it a poor choice of words, but it seems to have developed a meaning within Christianity that is not misunderstood by those who hear it, even across denominations.It is a word which goes beyond following God, as the saint says, and denotes an amount of malleability under the hand of God.Is this where your discrepency is? That the shift goes from our following to God's leading? I know this is a silly distinction, but it means a world of difference. We can have one man reading a book and attempting to emulate the words, and another living them out in his actions just by doing what he feels is right.How does a person view their Christianity. Is it a discipleship? Or is it the Spirit of God in union with them?The first disciples followed Jesus. Later, at Pentecost, the Spirit actully came into them and guided them. It took possession of them, so that they began to speak in tongues and to understand more of divine truth.When we use the word surrender, we have taken the emphasis from discipleship, and have placed it on becoming another Christ. It is not us, but God within us. Is this not Biblical?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

The one who is just going through the motions is the one who has surrendered. The one who truly understands why he does what he does has not surrendered.I think the Bible is pretty clear that Jesus wanted us to understand why we should return to the fold. If all He wanted was surrender, why would He waste His time with parables?

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It's deepens on God. This year, if you smoke, God may continue to allow you to smoke cigarretes. They may actually serve some purpose like calming you down so he can get your attention. Next year He may say you no longer need to smoke cigarretes. You may not hear a voice, but something may happen to you or a family member that makes you not want to smoke. God uses all things to guide you where He wants. For someone who has not surrendered, he has to question (choose) whether or not to listen. For the person who has totally surrendered, the choice has already been made. This person is simply waiting on the message from God. Anyone who chooses whether to listen to anything God is telling them has not surrendered their will. Anyone who has already choose to listen to what ever God tells them has surrender. I guess it's hard for you to believe but some people actually stopped choosing to choose.