SURRENDER

One winter, a  person dear to my heart was suffering and I had no ability to help. After several desperate, defiant attempts to fix the problem, I was forced to realize that all I had left to do was  place the situation in God’s hands. I can attest that in moments like this, no one wants to do this. Giving such problems to anyone, even to God, seems out of the question. Below, I share my story of how I learned, with God’s help, to let go. 

Resistance

During this time, whenever I sensed God’s presence, I felt dread rather than my usual peace, joy and gratitude. Instead of embracing this gift, I gave thanks and then resisted it. Still desperate to help my loved one, I offered my “portion” of God’s love for their cause. As if God’s love were a scarce resource, calibrated and divided according to some predetermined divine plan, I wanted my portion to go to my loved one. God’s response was surprising. Each time I refused the presence of God, I was pestered even more to accept it. I continued to resist and stupidly found myself in a game of stubbornness with Our Lord and Savior!  

Snap Out Of It!

While still in this posture towards God, I attended a day of prayer. As I listened to the presentation, I was frustrated to find that it didn’t resonate with my present circumstance. It was about spiritual darkness, a state of painful realization that you no longer sense the presence of God. This was precisely the opposite of my situation. Far from missing God’s presence, I was stuck with God’s persistent nagging to accept his gift of divine friendship, when all I wanted was for him to leave me alone and offer it to my loved one. 

On a break, with frustration mounting, I took a walk outside and arrived in an open meadow with nothing but snow-covered trees and a statue of Mary, similarly draped. It was one of those moments where everything in your life stops and beauty assaults you with awe and wonder. I knew God was no longer waiting patiently for me to acknowledge this unyielding offer. It felt like the scene from the movie Moonstruck when Cher’s character slaps Nicolas Cage’s character and says, “Snap out of it!”

Surrender

When the power of divine presence slapped me in the face, there was nothing left for me to do but surrender. Out loud, I said “Ok I give up; I accept your love.”  And dammed up tears gushed. I cried harder than ever before in my life. Embarrassed, I hid behind one of those lovely trees and just let it all out. It was quite painful and liberating at the same time. After the torrent of tears finished, I felt wiped out and a little lighter.

I believe that only in accepting God’s love do we learn to surrender our desire to be in control. When I said, “Ok I give up...” I wasn’t just giving in to God’s desire to love me. I gave it all up; my desire to fight against hope, my stubborn determination to make things right, and my unwillingness to accept the reality in front of me. This kind surrender is only possible in the presence of love. Without this, I believe my inordinate attachment to fixing things would still prevail in me, ultimately creating more sadness for me, my loved one, and God.

By allowing God to bring about my own healing, I was free to see the truth, accept it, and offer the only contribution that was truly helpful: my love made complete in God’s wholeness. In this open state, God’s power prevails in all directions. I am happy, God is happy, and my loved one is exposed to a love completely given. God’s love is never there for just one of us, it is always universally given.

In the face of continuing hardship, God devotedly teaches me to let go of all that hinders my own healing. This is all God really wants of us – to be as whole and healthy as we were at our creation. I have come to accept that God wants this for my loved ones as much as for me. This acceptance brings me freedom from my inordinate desire to fix and from my ridiculous desire to do it all by myself.

I have been back to that retreat house many times and I always stop at that meadow and give thanks. That experience commenced a long and wonderful journey into the love of God. Exploring the depth and intensity of this love gives me all I need.

Open Heart

I believe we are our own worst enemy, when we allow our attachments to thwart God’s constant communication. Our humanity can very subtly ease God out of the picture, if we allow it. This is where regular prayer helps. In his podcast, James Finley offers his idea of what deep prayer might look like. If I may, I recommend you read this more than once:

Your practice might be some form of meditation, such as sitting motionless in silence, attentive and awake to the abyss-like nature of each breath. Your practice might be simple, heartfelt prayer, slowly reading the scriptures, gardening, baking bread, writing or reading poetry, drawing or painting, or perhaps running or taking long, slow walks to no place in particular. Your practice may be to be alone, really alone, without any addictive props and diversions. Or your practice may be that of being with that person in whose presence you are called to a deeper place. The critical factor is not so much the practice in its externals as the extent to which the practice incarnates an utterly sincere stance of awakening and surrendering to the Godly nature of the present moment.(emphasis added)

This kind of praying is not an offering of tremendous time but of your sincere will. It requires a brave stance of openness to God. Such a stance may seem impossible to achieve, blocked by a lifetime of personal obstacles; however my story illustrates that it takes only one second to surrender. 

Such openness acknowledges your faith in God, encourages your hope in God, and allows you to own your love for God. Only after this happens will habitual prayer and deep relationship with God naturally develop. Then the time spent in relationship with God becomes as easy as time spent with any other loved one in your life. 

If you believe you are not deep, brave, or capable enough, I assure you, neither am I. None of us are capable without God’s help. Friendship with the Divine begins with a desire to know and love God. This desire is not ours, although we think it is. It is God stirring us up with the gentle hope that we will “snap out of” our clinging frailties that barricade themselves from the face of God.

God helped me find my open stance through love for my loved one. How is God working in you right now? Is there a strong desire you struggle with? Could God be using that to help you find a clear path to his pure love for you? If your answer is “I have no idea” you are on the right track. Look to God for direction. It will be provided.

He made from one the whole human race to dwell on the entire surface of the earth, and he fixed the ordered seasons and the boundaries of their regions, so that people might seek God, even perhaps grope for him and find him, though indeed he is not far from any one of us. For ‘In him we live and move and have our being…..

Acts 17: 26-28