Surrender

Crossword clue: “Wave the white flag.”  

Answer? Surrender. 

The white flag is a sign of truce that requests for negotiation. It also symbolizes surrender, since it is the weaker party which requests for negotiation. 

Have you ever felt like waving the white flag? When we are saddled with problems, giving up seems to be the easiest way out. 

In Scripture, Job, a faithful man of God, lived out the real and true meaning of the word surrender. He lost his children and wealth, then he was struck with painful and ugly sores over his entire body. His friends shunned him and he became a pariah; his good life was razed to the ground.    

Instead of encouraging Job to endure, his wife added to his pain by saying, “Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9 NLT). She thought God abandoned Job in his time of trouble.

The response of Job’s wife is similar to ours when everything seems to crumble. Job, however, rebukes her. He tells her that we are to accept all—both good and bad—from the Lord, trusting that His plan is best. 

In short, it is not waving the white flag, which is what we use to mean “I give up!" 

Surrender means offering and leaving our life and all that we have to God. 

Surrendering therefore is completely giving up our own will, so that our thoughts and deeds are placed in God’s care. 

James 5:10–11 (NLT) reminds us, “. . . We give great honor to those who endure under suffering. For instance. . . Job, a man of great endurance. You can see how the Lord was kind to him at the end, for the Lord is full of tenderness and mercy.” 

Job gives us, despairing people, the clue: surrender our all to the rescuing grace of God. 

Let’s make a covenant with God today by singing the chorus of the hymn, All to Jesus I Surrender (written by Judson W. Van DeVenter [1855–1939], and put to music by Winfield S. Weeden):