East Coast Korean Camp Meeting

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Andrews Korean Church

Plenary

Chester Clark

The Need to Know

Giving Up All

Where Are We

Father Abraham

Lamp Feet

Building Altars

This Is Good

Always Giving

Looking To Jesus

Father in heaven, I thank you that you've given to us the opportunity to once again gather together to consider your Word.

Lord, as we have heard so much today, so much practical testimony of your power, of how we can live lives united with You, abiding in You.

I just pray that even tonight that Your Spirit would still speak to our hearts, that You would just give us clear minds and that you would show us something that would be useful and help us in our heavenward journey.

I kept thinking about this topic and there was part of me that said, you know, So much of this has already been talked about, you know, just sort of along the way when we talk about surrender and what that means through the personal testimonies that have been shared, we've already heard about it.

But you know, in some ways I think I have to allow the Holy Spirit to do its work and when the Holy Spirit has shared similar burdens with me and others I think I need to go ahead and follow that vein.

So I'm going to be talking tonight on what I call giving up and giving all.

We're going to make this shorter because we have a question and answer period to follow.

So I'm going to try to be as succinct as possible.

But it really, I like simplifying the Christian life.

I think sometimes, you know, as a kid I thought there's just so much for me to know and it was overwhelming at times.

And I find other people have a similar sensation of just, where do I start?

And So I just like to make it as simple as possible.

Last night we talked about 2 things we need to know in order to be saved, knowing yourself and knowing Jesus.

And I really do believe it's that simple.

Now I think that there's a lot along the way that He's going to teach us, but those are the 2 things that He needs to teach us so that we can make a good decision.

And when we know ourselves and when we know Jesus, there's a decision we have to make.

And if I could boil down our part of the Christian life to 1 word, and please don't, I'm not trying to oversimplify, I'm not trying to overgeneralize, but if I had to just say 1 word of what my part in the Christian walk is, I would use the word surrender.

So we're going to look at surrender from 2 perspectives tonight, giving up and giving all.

You know, the story is told of Lord Nelson, the famous British admiral.

And Lord Nelson had just won a splendid victory at sea, and the French admiral who he had overpowered was surrendering.

They were walking together to meet each other on the deck of the ship, and the admiral was, the French admiral was dressed in all of his regalia, and he approaches Nelson to surrender.

Now you understand those dress uniforms and how they are with the, well, they actually have a weapon too, don't they?

And as this French admiral approached Lord Nelson, his sword was swinging by his side and the admiral put out his hand to shake the hand of the British commander.

Lord Nelson stepped back and he said, your sword first, please.

You see, there are times when I think that we would like to be able to surrender on our own terms.

We want our own way, you know, we want the peace that forgiveness can bring, we want the relationship with God, but we really want it on our own terms.

We might even want it with as little humbling of ourselves as possible.

And just like the leper Naaman, who suggested he had alternate means to cure leprosy.

There were better rivers in Damascus, right?

And he didn't want to humble himself to the 1 way that God had provided for him to be cleansed.

We too have that same resistance to submitting to God's way of healing our leprosy, of cleansing our sin problems.

So there's some who believe that they can come to Jesus on their own terms.

They want a customized personal definition of surrender that allows them to retain that which they want and give up what they don't want.

And the French admiral had to realize he lost and he was not going to be trusted to shake Nelson's hand without first giving up his weapon, completely helpless, and given into the superior's hand.

So some people might say, just let me be religious.

I'll do this and so, but not such and such.

And I believe that surrender is a very, very important thing for us to understand.

And to be saved, I don't believe that we have to be intellectual or theological.

We only need to experience what is always within the reach of every single 1 of us.

And that's to surrender our lives to Jesus Christ.

There are a number of reasons why I think that this is confusing.

We'll look at, or at least we have a hard time doing it, We'll look at a number of those here in the few minutes we have together.

But Jeremiah chapter 29, 13 has come to take on new meaning to me as I have studied it.

I used to think that Jesus was playing some sort of celestial hide and seek.

That in order to find salvation, in order to find Jesus, we would have to look really, really hard.

It says, "...and you will seek me and find me when you do what?

So this is this game of hide and seek that God was playing with us.

We've got to look really, really hard to find Him.

But as I studied the Bible more and as I studied what God's plan is for me more, I see how Jesus says, if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all unto me.

As I see that God is working in our lives before we even realize He's working there.

Even when we don't want Him to be working there, He's working in our lives.

As I understand that God who delivered up His own Son for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?

As I realize what God's investment is in this salvation process, it doesn't make sense to me that He's gonna make it hard for us, that He's gonna make it difficult for us to find it, you know?

That He's gonna be like, well, you know, find me if you can, I'm gonna be hiding out here somewhere.

This searching for me with all of your heart and then it dawned on me.

I hope I'm not twisting the scripture here, but this is how I've come to understand this passage.

The only way we find Him is when we're willing to surrender all of our heart.

That's the all of our heart that is going to bring about guaranteed a promise here.

You'll seek me and find me when you search for me with all of your heart.

In other words, I'm willing to put everything on the altar.

I'm willing to surrender everything to Jesus Christ.

All that is needed is an unreserved surrender.

Now My heart has been as thrilled as I've listened to what has been shared today about prayer and the study of God's Word.

I've been personally convicted I need to spend more intentional time in prayer and in praise and in study.

And I've been blessed by this time together.

I've also learned that if I'm not careful, I could start thinking that it's what I do that is going to give me a relationship with God.

If I'm not careful, I might start to look at it almost like a sacrament.

And That's going to give me a relationship with God.

And I've even caught myself, I've even caught myself, maybe you understand what I'm talking about.

Sometimes I just need to read the book of Romans and the book Steps to Christ all over again and remind myself because we naturally tend to try to earn our salvation.

And I catch myself doing something like this.

I've said something, I've disappointed, I've hurt, I've whatever.

I know that I've not been abiding in Christ.

I've caught myself subconsciously thinking, well, you know, tomorrow I'm going to have better devotions.

Tomorrow I'll start over and I'll make it right.

And my friends, I just want to say something that the Lord has taught me.

I believe tomorrow I need to do that, but I don't need to wait until tomorrow to be right with Jesus.

I don't need to wait until I have longer devotions or better prayer time to be right with Jesus.

Right now, I go to Him just as I am and I surrender my life and my sin and my heart again to Him.

You know we really don't have tomorrow promised to us, do we?

Today when we hear His voice speaking to us we should respond.

And so surrender has taken on a moment by moment, day by day importance for me in my walk with my Lord.

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Series

Plenary

Giving Up All

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

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