Sincerely, Surrender
Have you ever felt shamed by a worship song? I have.
On a recent Sunday, we were singing a song called “All I Am” by Phil Wickham at the close of the worship service. It’s a good song, and the lyrics are all about surrendering to God, which is the same idea that had been explored in the sermon. But as I was singing it and inviting others to sing it with me, I was struck by the distance between the meaning of the words coming out of my mouth and the actual condition of my heart.
“I give you all my life
I’m letting it go
A living sacrifice
No longer my own
All I am is yours
I give you everything
To you I belong
Every beat of my heart
The breath in my lungs
All I am is yours”
I realized I was singing with ease words that cannot be taken lightly. The song was more sincere than I was, and I knew I needed to do something with that realization. The song had to become for me not a celebration of the way things are but a confession of the way things are not. It had to become a prayer—a way of asking for things to be as they ought.
I’m not sure I’ve ever enjoyed a moment of complete and utter surrender to God. At my best, I’ve maybe had moments where everything I knew to surrender had been surrendered. But looking back, even in those moments, there were unknown corners of idolatry in the temple of my heart. And again, that’s me at my best.
More often than not, I know the areas God wants me to surrender, and when he brings them to my attention—even in the middle of singing a worship song—I try to change the subject. Parenthetically, it’s amazing that God, the one who made the universe and everything in it, is patient enough to allow us this small, creaturely dignity—he allows us the freedom to give him the cold shoulder, even as he invites us to life, and life abundant. At any rate, God has on many occasions brought something to the light only to have me snatch it back into the shadows and effectively say to him, “I’m not ready to trust you with that yet.”
But sometimes, I do trust him. And in those precious few and wildly important moments, I am being saved. Saved from my self, who would destroy me. Saved to live instead as the self that is most truly myself—one who finds true joy and so much peace in total surrender to the only One who perfectly loves me.
D. L. Moody said that the trouble with living sacrifices is they keep crawling off the altar. This is why I think it’s important to sing songs that are more sincere than we are. Far from shaming us, they are instead a momentary mirror inviting us to make a choice. We can choose to sing words we don’t mean while pretending we do. We can choose not to sing at all. Or, we can sing the words as a prayer—a prayer that beckons us into a reality that is not yet but ought to be, and perhaps, with God’s kindness and help, one day will be.
Oh God, may we awaken to a day where every beat of our hearts belongs to you. Amen.
Andy Simonds is the worship pastor at Summit Church. He enjoys building self-sustaining aquatic ecosystems and implementing smart home solutions.