Taking the form of a slave…

This is what Jesus did scripture tells us…

The Lord has been showing me that there is great freedom in this position of slavery…

Jesus tells us so Himself – He says, “Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me… and you shall find rest for your souls”…

Imagine never again making a single decision for your life – imagine allowing Jesus to make them all for you…

Imagine that…

What does it feel like?

Do you feel peace?

Do you feel disappointed?

Do you feel sad?

Do you feel affronted?

Do you feel ripped off?

What does it do to you?

I’ve felt all of the above – with the various surrenders which I’ve made to the Lord – and I believe it is a natural part of the process of taking on His yoke – the yoke is not immediately fitting or agreeable – and you are literally yoked to Christ so when He moves whether you move or not you are literally dragged along with Him – after you’ve first made that free will decision to take His yoke upon you – once you take it you don’t take it off…

It’s made forever – “I love My Master – I will not go free”…

It’s that sort of decision…

It’s the difference between salvation and discipleship…

At every turn we have decisions…

The only right decision is to surrender completely to Christ…

Why?

I bet you’re thinking I’m going to give some trite answer which you’ll all nod your heads to and say, “Amen”, well you’re wrong…

The reason which we should surrender to Christ is that only in surrender to Christ do we know Him more…

We can never be satisfied – our new self can never be satisfied – with the level it has attained to in the knowledge of God and the only way to go deeper is to surrender deeper – which means slavery…

Every decision is made by Christ – you are not in control of any decision which you make – and the peace which comes with this is that you know that you’re doing what He wants you to do and because you trust Him you trust that what He is leading you into is causing you to know Him more…

I’m not going to go into the other reason – the Glory of God – this just randomly comes out of us – but it brings Glory to the Lord to take the form of a slave like Jesus did – us doing this displays Jesus’ Glory to the world – they get to see Him through us over and over again…

Like He’d never left…

And that glorifies God – but God tells us to come and take His yoke not so that He’ll get glory but because He can see that we are weary and heavy laden and He wants to give us rest to our souls…

That’s a very nice God… 🙂

Slavery to God brings rest to our souls…

Why is that?

Because God is the only Master who is more interested in our wellbeing than we are in our own…

We don’t even know what is good for us or necessary – but He does – thus He is the only one who can be trusted with our lives – thus every submission is actually a calculated gamble – you could say (if you were a cynic) – at getting more peace into your life – a scary but rewarding, risky but such a sense of release, type decision…

God knows us – He doesn’t ask for the impossible – He didn’t create us to make life a huge struggle – He didn’t – He wanted us to enjoy Him and the only way was to be slaves to Him…

Sounds strange – but makes a whole lot of sense – once you have been won by His love – you see that His slavery is freedom…

Even Paul – on behalf of Jesus – says this, “It is for freedom that Christ set you free – stand firm therefore and do not let yourselves be entangled again with a yoke of bondage (the word in the Greek is slavery)”…

A yoke of bondage was the try hard approach…

A yoke a freedom is Christ’s…

Choose this day whom you will serve…

🙂

Love,

Andrew

(Ps. The Holy Spirit inside you does all the work – you just have to surrender to Him and even in this He does the surrendering through you – He does – I have experienced this – so everything truly is done in rest – it really is – it just keeps getting better and better… 🙂 Love you, Andrew)