I’ll never forget the day I took the door off my daughter’s room. No, I didn’t knock it down! She was mad about something (I really don’t even remember what it was) and went upstairs to her room and slammed her door. I quietly walked upstairs to her room, took the screwdriver out, and unscrewed the hinges on the door from the doorframe. She looked at me and said, “What are you doing?” I told her, “I’m taking your door.” She said, “When can I have it back?” I replied, “I’m really not sure.” This was a huge lesson in submission. She had to submit to the rules we had in our home, or she would have to live a life full of recurring consequences. Before it was over, the lesson learned was one of submission. She submitted her personal desires to the will of her parents. This is exactly what the disciples learned.
The disciples learned this very early in their time with Jesus. Jesus asked each of them to lay aside their personal preferences and allegiances and live a life of absolute submission. Jesus demanded total submission. Each of the disciples in their own way would eventually become leaders in an organic and spiritual movement that would change the world with the amazing news that Christ died, was buried, rose on the third day, and ascended back to heaven.
What did this mean for the disciples? It meant spending three of the best years of their life with the One who would eventually shed His blood and give his last breath for their eternity. But what they learned throughout their years with Him was submission. They learned to submit to His teaching. They learned to submit to His authority. They learned to submit to His desires. They learned submission from the One who submitted completely to His own Father.
In leadership, we cannot lead with integrity until we first learn to submit completely to God. It has been said that we cannot lead others until we first learn to lead ourselves. While this saying is quoted in leadership conferences all over the world, I believe it is incomplete. We cannot lead others until we first learn to submit ourselves to God. Sooner or later, people who fail to submit to God will implode from the self-seeking desire to lead others in their own strength, power, vision, and self-promotion.
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How do we do it? How do we submit? I believe there are several ways we submit to the Lord.
We submit our time
I don’t know if you notice it or not, but we schedule what we see as important. If you aren’t having a regular time with the Lord, begin now. It’s never too late to begin a great thing! Make submitting to God a priority in your day. Every day you wait to submit your time to the Lord is another day away from experiencing His best for you.
We submit our plans (Proverbs 16:9)
We do this by spiritually evaluating each of the issues in choices we make daily because they are that important. But, at the end of the day, God is the One with the last say in what we do because He is sovereign over our lives. Do you ever wonder what God thinks of our plans? Do you think that maybe our plans are too small? Are our plans sometimes made without even considering God? How can you include God in your plans?
We submit our will
I want to expose a myth to you. There is no such thing as a weak-willed child. Every child ever born is a strong-willed child. We were created with a will and selfish desires. Submitting our will is something that does not come naturally. In fact, many of us have to become broken before we can submit. In my own experience, the only way we can submit our will to the Lord’s will is to recognize that His will for our lives will produce so much greater and more amazing things than we can ever imagine. Do you have a difficult time with a selfish will? Do you ever just want to do things because you feel entitled? What would you consider to be the one thing that keeps you from submitting your will to God’s will?
Take a few minutes and ask God to soften your heart so that you can completely submit to Him so that He can use you to impact others for His purposes.