Submission

Submission is not something that we generally emphasize in the West. We emphasize initiative, action, planning, creative solutions, etc... All of these are good things, but I am realizing how hard, and how unnatural, it is for me to submit. Perhaps this is just human nature, but it seems to me that submission is particularly difficult for those of us raised in the West. In America in particular, we are raised to be strong individuals who look out for ourselves. In the scandalous era in which we live, we have learned cynicism and distrust rather than submission. Authority is something to be questioned, power is something to be balanced, kings are to be overthrown. In this context how can we look on submission with anything short of incredulity and skepticism.

I am very much a product of my culture. Living and working overseas for roughly a decade has stretched my horizons, but has also shown me how much my own culture has influenced me in ways that are subtle and often hard to identify. I find myself struggling with submission. I praise God that He has taken me through a training school of hard knocks to teach me to submit to the leaders that He has placed over me, and yet, deep in my heart there lies a lack of submission to God specifically. I am finding submission especially difficult lately because it seems that He has assigned me a particularly odious task.

It seems like God's marching order for me these days is to wait. He continually draws me to passages with this emphasis and the quiet witness of the Spirit in my heart is to wait, to be still. Just this evening I was reminded of Is. 30. The people of Israel would not wait for the Lord and His plan for them. Instead they made plans to save themselves. The Lord responds in verse 15: “In repentance and rest is your salvation,in quietness and trust is your strength,but you would have none of it." I find so much of my own journey reflected in the attitudes and actions of the Israelites.

I am a man of action. I need something to do, a mountain to climb, a challenge to overcome, a task to accomplish. I want to move things along, to drive things. Sometimes I think I would rather move in the wrong direction rather than just sit still. So, the Lord is asking me to wait, to be still and know that He is God, to rest in quietness and trust. This is among the toughest assignments He could give me. Waiting on Him is contrary to my heart, my culture, my personality, my training. Everything in me screams to get moving, to plan the next steps, to think my way out of the doldrums; but He tells me to wait, to be still, to trust. So, here I am waiting, praying that He will speak and release me from the prison of stillness, learning to submit to the King of the Universe.