Unconditional Surrender

As a dude who speaks every Sunday, about topics spanning the spectrum from sex to Jesus, there are days when I wake up and realize what I should have said. Or what I wanted to say. Or I’ll find someone who said what I was trying to say so much better than I actually said it. So here is a quote from a really old British guy, whom I think is brilliant. His name is John Stott, sometimes referred to as the protestant pope, and on the issue of surrender writes:

“Our attitude to our fallen nature should be one of ruthless repudiation. For ‘those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires’ (Galatians 5:24). That is, we have taken this evil, slimy, slippery thing called ‘the flesh’ and nailed it to the cross. This was our initial repentance. Crucifixion is dramatic imagery for our uncompromising rejection of all known evil. Crucifixion does not lead to a quick or easy death; it is an execution of lingering pain. Yet it is decisive; there is no possibility of escaping from it.
“Our attitude to the Holy Spirit, on the other hand, is to be one of unconditional surrender. Paul uses several expressions for this. We are to ‘live by the Spirit’, to be ‘led by the Spirit’ and to ‘keep in step with the Spirit (Galatians 5:16,18,25). That is, we are to allow him his rightful sovereignty over us, and follow his righteous promptings.
“Thus both our repudiation of the flesh and our surrender to the Spirit need to be repeated daily…” (John Stott, Authentic Christianity, pp 83)