Surrender | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: Surrender | Previous Challenge Entry
By Kate Maddox
02/21/05
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As Stacey struggled with the decision in front of her, she prayed. “Dear Lord, help me be willing to let go and do Your will.” She had learned years ago that only by surrendering her will to God could she have true peace. The Lord had saved her then, and He could surely handle her current problem. This one was easy, compared to what He had done for her before.

That dark morning in 1999, Stacey had reached a point of total despair. Fearful and alone, she was willing to do anything in order to be saved from the destruction of her life—destruction she had created herself, though her own choices. As she lay in her bed, sick from the excess of wine she had drunk the night before, she reviewed the path of misery she had been stumbling down for the past seven years.

As a teenager, Stacey had rejected God and the faith of her youth. When her mother, a gentle, Christian woman, had died suddenly in a car accident, Stacey felt abandoned by God. All of the hope she had put in God was gone. She felt betrayed, tricked, lost. How could God take away her precious mother, who had taught her to trust and love the Lord? Stacey didn’t understand, and she had turned to alcohol to kill the pain. It was easier than feeling the knife of grief that pierced her heart.

That morning, sick and in despair, Stacey surveyed the wreckage in her life. Failed relationships, a burden of debt and a bankrupt spirit were all she had to claim. Stacey sobbed deep cries of anguish and fell out of bed to her knees.

“Dear God, please help me,” she cried, tears of remorse falling down her cheeks and soaking her bedspread. “I can’t go on like this. I can’t do it anymore. I need your help. I am willing, Lord. I am willing.”

Still sobbing, Stacey lay her head on the bed and emptied her soul to the Lord, the Lord she had trusted in so long ago, when things were safe and good and right. The Lord she had abandoned. For she realized then that God had not abandoned her. She had abandoned God.

“Lord, forgive me,” Stacey prayed. “I have sinned. You alone can save me.” She remembered what she had learned in Sunday school and from her mother all those years ago, about what Jesus had done for her on the cross. How He had died so people who believed in Him could be saved from their sin and have eternal life.

Deep in her soul, she was willing to believe. She was willing to seek the help she so desperately needed. She surrendered. A gentle peace fell over Stacey, warm and soft like angel’s breath. She felt her soul breathe, and she knew what she needed to do. She rose, and she picked up the phone to find help for her addiction.

Now, sober and standing at the crossroads of another decision, she knew what to do. Once again, she had to turn her life over to God. “Thy will be done, Father,” Stacey breathed. And peace enveloped her.

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