This should be an interesting year for me…the Lord took my love and life partner on the 7th of this month …
the test of His Lordship in my life will be my next challenge…
What an incredible blessing to be able to jot down thoughts and rehearse what God continues to teach me through His Word and the people and events in my life. Thank you to those of you who continue to follow my journey with the King.
On behalf of our family, we would like to extend our deepest gratitude
for the love and suppor that you have showered
upon us throughout this journey of temendous loss and hope.
All any of us has to share with others is our weakness translated into a life message for the benefit of another. At the Celebration of Life for my beloved husband, Ralph, so many communicated how his life had touched and influenced theirs. We both trust God has used our flaws to manifest His strength for your benefit. Every weakness I have is an opportunity for God to show His strength in my life.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
II Cor. 12: 9-10
Jim Elliot, husband of Elizabeth Elliot, who was martyred at the hand of the Auca Indians, once said:
“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”
Genuine Christianity is an unconditional surrender to His Lordship!
While attending the University of Arizona I was invited to join Kappa Alpha Theta, a national sorority. I had a sense of acceptance and grew to love the girls and the accountability. After a semester of initiation, we had a night of mild hazing that culminated in stepping individually behind a veil for the final step of becoming a Theta. As the pledge of loyalty was read and the words were spoken to me… I was asked to repeat them. I instantly realized I had already pledged my loyalty to my new Savior, Jesus Christ.
A few months earlier, over the Thanksgiving holiday with my parents and sisters, I had attended a church service and had heard for the first time in my life that I could know God in a personal way through my total surrender to His Son, Jesus Christ. Standing behind that curtain I was struck, profoundly, when I realized I had already given my total allegiance to the Lord Jesus Christ that Thanksgiving weekend! When He walked into my life everything changed, I had no more allegiance to give.
Time has tested on life’s stage that unconditional surrender
I made to my loving Savior and Sovereign Lord in those college days.
What is your present commitment?
When we talk about a total surrendering of our lives to the Lordship of Christ, we are talking about yielding all our rights and expectations!
· A dying to self and self-attitudes
· A yielding of all entitlements and self-interest
WHAT…WAIT A MINUTE!
Don’t we run from the people and circumstances that call us into total commitment? It is much easier to go with the flow as the secular, ungodly world dictates to us relativity, independence and “I have my rights!” The world’s motto: “Strength only…show no weakness!” The human struggle wants HIS power to do OUR will.
Is humility a position of strength or weakness, in your opinion?
Humility is me… seeing the contrast between my spiritual condition (a sinner) and God’s holiness and then surrendering all to receive His grace to live Christ-like, not Jackie-like!
Phil. 3:10 Grace is doing His will with His power! It is acknowledging His presence and His power to live the Christian life. Victory is living in that truth!
Are you living in Victory?
Have you surrendered your life to His Lordship?
~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America. Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California. My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights.
