*For the Easter presentation for this year, you are invited to the presentation on March 31, 2015. Thanks. This is our Good Friday presentation - the day we honor and remember the day of the Crucifixion of Jesus.
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Father, into Your hands I give my spirit.
*Jesus (On the Cross)
and sweet sweet surrender is all that I have to give
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That soul has now delivered itself into His hands and His great love has so subdued it that it neither knows nor desires anything save that God shall do with it what He wills.
*St. Teresa of Avila
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Surrender, in the spiritual sense, we return to again and again. This process deepens, surrender following surrender. We even surrender resistance to surrender, finally. Surrender becomes no longer a spiritual project, with its earlier self-consciousness; surrender becomes our natural way of living, joyfully and unselfconsciously. It simply is our way to live sanely in this world, with others.
The ego says, “If you surrender, that is weakness. If you surrender, you will be taken advantage of. If you surrender, things will not turn out as you wish. If you surrender, you will not be given the things you most deeply long for. If you surrender, you are abdicating responsibility.”
The Christ Self says, “One of the strongest, most courageous things you can do is surrender. In surrender Life's plan for you is so great that no one can ultimately, finally take advantage of you or have power over you. If you surrender, you will have what you truly wish for. If you surrender, Love will meet your deepest needs and fulfil your grandest desires. If you surrender, you are acting as you are here to act, therefore, you are being responsible. If you surrender, you are putting yourself in agreement with Life, with the Universe, with Grace, with what many call God.”
Megan Don, in Falling into the Arms of God, writes, "Ironically, when we release the separation we will no longer be surviving, we will be flourishing.” Does this not sound somewhat counter-logical? Does not the Way of Christ do just that: Provide a path to a flourishing Life through a logic that contradicts the survival logic that leads to isolation, separation, and spiritual deathliness? Did not Jesus say to his early followers, "I have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly"? Is that full-Life not our birthright, together? Spiritually subtraction means addition: we give up our life, and receive our life, in return.
Finally, what we give ourselves to is not a particular someone or something, but to Life. Finally, we discover our ultimate gift is, not someone or something, but ourselves. Finally, we know that Love is our deepest longing, and Love is what we give ourselves to, and in this surrender we surrender into Love. Love is our inspiration and our destiny. We give ourselves to Love by Love.
