“Defined by Surrender” | originally published June 21, 2022
Have you ever been in the middle of one of life’s lessons, questioning the circumstances and reflecting on how it all happened, to be hit with a revelation? Or even an answer to some of those questions swimming around in your thoughts?
An epiphany!
One of these moments happened for me last week. I was enjoying the second session of our women’s Bible study summer series, “Out of Control: Living with a Surrendered Heart.” The topic of that week’s conversation was The Fear of Surrender.
It never ceases to amaze me how God so beautifully orchestrates the ebb and flow of life to allow such timely messages for my heart.
As we all sat outside on the church patio together, I couldn’t help but admire the gorgeous colors of the backdrop accented with green leaves and little yellow flowers against the cloudy gray sky. One of the things about Southern California that continually sparks gratitude in my heart is the color that blooms with spring and summer.
The view reminded me of another article I wrote back in October of last year – A Perspective Shift
It was this same setting under our patio canopy that inspired those words as well. I love that these trees change the color theme of the backdrop depending on the season and time of year. It brought this passage to mind.
For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant and a time to harvest. A time to kill and a time to heal. A time to tear down and a time to build up. A time to cry and a time to laugh. A time to grieve and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones and a time to gather stones. A time to embrace and a time to turn away. A time to search and a time to quit searching. A time to keep and a time to throw away. A time to tear and a time to mend. A time to be quiet and a time to speak. A time to love and a time to hate. A time for war and a time for peace. What do people really get for all their hard work? I have seen the burden God has placed on us all. Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. So I concluded there is nothing better than to be happy and enjoy ourselves as long as we can. And people should eat and drink and enjoy the fruits of their labor, for these are gifts from God. Ecclesiastes 3:1-13 NLT
Our family is walking into a new season . . . one of those times to grieve. My husband lost his job. After 11 years at the same company, he didn’t have much of a choice when their California office closed last week. So, work looks a lot differently now. We are restructuring routines and roles, and finding more and more ways to save. My saver-spirit has kicked into high gear!
It has also become a season to plant – the veggie garden – so that when the season to harvest is here we can save on our grocery budget! 👩🌾
Even though it can be scary not knowing what’s around the corner in this season, I’m looking forward to whatever pleasant surprises God has in store for us.
He has already proven Himself faithful
so we are trusting Him as He guides us down this new direction of His will!
You can imagine where my prayers traveled during a quiet time of reflection at Bible study on Wednesday. I began contemplating what surrender looks like in my life these days. As followers of Jesus, God asks us to surrender our lives to Him.
That includes giving Him our goals, desires, fears, anxiety, purpose, timelines . . .
It’s hard not to jump into any new line of work that comes our way just to have a steady income, when our intention is waiting on the Lord’s guidance to follow where He leads. It requires a level of trust that can feel outside of logic and reason.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV
It’s almost like God knew we would be in this predicament when this passage was written! 😉 Okay, Lord, I hear ya.
As I sat there in surrender, pondering on the patio, all of a sudden a breeze picked up and it started snowing little, yellow flowers!
Oh my goodness, I can’t begin to describe my joy in that moment. It’s hard to capture in a picture, but I imagined spinning around in a flowy, princess dress, arms outstretched with my face to the sky,
dancing in the flower rain.
As beautiful as the shower of flowers was, it got me thinking. The reality was that the flowers were dying away, no longer brightening the trees. It’s the colorful beauty of spring that falls away to summer and autumn, eventually leaving the branches bare in winter.
I’m familiar with what these trees look like in the winter. In my opinion, they’re nothing special; however, that doesn’t mean their spring and summer beauty was any less than what I enjoyed in this moment of the flower-fall. In those cold and dreary seasons I have the memory of what was once full of life, and that helps me anticipate what’s to come again.
It’s a dormant beauty.
Seasons of both abundance and scarcity are beautiful in the lens of heaven, because of who God is, and what He is using each season to accomplish in our lives. However, I think that adopting this perspective requires another aspect of surrender.
Surrendering our identity.
What things in life do we sometimes let define us? Career success and financial abundance, or possibly well-behaved children and a clean house? Does that mean that our job losses, parenting fails and mistakes, or unmet goals have their place in the definition of our identity as well? Let’s not allow circumstances to define us.
Let us discover our identity in the Creator and His character.
Even during those painful seasons of discouraging loss in our lives, God is still the One in control. He is still faithful. He is still kind. God sees each of us individually and cares for the little details that spark joy in our hearts.
But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” Lamentations 3:21-24 ESV
Updated January 17, 2024
It’s now been over a year and a half since Adam first faced unemployment after decades of consistent work. At the time, he was diligent to explore every avenue of financial support that he could provide for our family.
This included his freelance writing gigs – entertainment articles, ghost writing, editing, his own blog writing and audiobook . . . the list goes on. It was so cool to see his hard work and effort to care for his family only increase upon the discouraging circumstances.
Fast forward from those uncertain times to now, and he is still actively working in the writing industry. And he’s not just surviving, he’s thriving! What started off as simply filling in the gaps of income loss has become his consistent and successful writing outlet.
God has brought Adam’s pursuits in the writing industry full circle. Did you know that his undergraduate degree was in Literature and Writing? And his first grad school education was in the same area.
Until Adam’s unemployment, he had been working in jobs that paid the bills but weren’t in line with his career goals. It wasn’t until that very difficult season of job hunting and endless applications that God paved the way for Adam to have not only a full time job in his industry of choice, but also a self-employed business doing what he loves.
I can’t end this blog post without giving God the glory for His continued faithfulness in the lives of His children. I’m so grateful that He chose to let us see what His plan was from the beginning of that difficult season of unemployment. He’s shown us that sometimes the detour is necessary to take us someplace even better than our original destination.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28 NIV
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Thank you Stacia for this encouragement! I am so sorry to hear of the loss of the job for your family. I will be praying for God’s divine direction and provision! As you already noted, our God is faithful!!!!