Surrender is a painful process. It requires letting go, laying down, and ultimately death. Not physical death, but a living death which requires denial to ones own wants and desires in order to create room for a far greater fullness.

This is the lesson I am currently in the process of learning and sense I will continue to discover for the remainder of this life. So often I believe that in my own ability, in my own wisdom and knowledge I will be able to carry on. That somehow I can figure out the answers to life. No wonder I so often find myself lost in the nothingness of my own strength. It never carries me very far, and when it does it never seems to be in the right direction.

These first few days in Honduras have allowed me to see how truly helpless I am, especially when it comes to leading my team. I have nothing to offer. No great wisdom or insight that will carry anyone very far. In me, there is nothing to bring; nothing good resides in me.

This is when surrender enters the picture. Through surrender I must choose to lay my own life down and bare my soul before God. The work of surrender empties me of me and allows room for the Holy Spirit to take control. I believe the act of surrender is the single hardest decision one will ever make if choosing to do so. In fact it is not merely a one-time resolve but a lifestyle, a continual dying to self to allow for the life of Christ to live in and through me. Through the pain of surrender one finds not loss, but life to the fullest.