How Do I keep Sanctified? Part two: Not my will

Manual 515.516 Core duties of the Pastor

Not My Will, But Yours Be Done!

Review: A couple Wednesdays ago we were in chapter 10 entitled “How Do I Keep Sanctified”.

The first point was that we need to be “Absolutely Sincere” in your relationship with people and with God.

Today’s point is “we must have a complete coordination between your will and the will of God.

To open up todays Lesson, I want to ask- Who in scripture does it say that we should submit too?

 Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.

(NKJV)

13 Therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether to the king as supreme, 14 or to governors, as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good. 15 For this is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men—

(NKJV)

7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

Examples of the submission of Christ

(NKJV)

39 Coming out, He went to the Mount of Olives, as He was accustomed, and His disciples also followed Him. 40 When He came to the place, He said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” 41 And He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and prayed, 42 saying, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.” 43 Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven, strengthening Him. 44 And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. 45 When He rose up from prayer, and had come to His disciples, He found them sleeping from sorrow. 46 Then He said to them, “Why do you sleep? Rise and pray, lest you enter into temptation.”

Have you ever stood before God and shamelessly demanded your own way on something?

Have you ever grabbed him by the throat, so to speak, and demanded that he make your life work? Now! Have you ever demanded that he come through for you, or else…? Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not talking about persistent, genuine, heartfelt prayer. I’m talking about idolatry. I’m talking about, “I want this no matter what!”

All of us, at one time or another—perhaps right now—have clasped our grubby little fingers too tightly around our kids, possessions, money, hopes, and expectations and then demanded that God uphold our agendas, incessantly “inviting” him to bless our ambitions.

But this is not the pattern of the Christian life that our Lord demonstrated for us and to which he now graciously summons us. He enjoyed unadulterated and uninterrupted peace in his relationship with God for he learned obedience through his sufferings (). Rather than turning his heart away from God in angry defiance and demandingness, he submitted to the One who loved him. “During his earthly life Christ offered up both requests and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death and he was heard because of his reverent submission” ().

Is “reverent submission” the pattern in our lives?

Based on scripture I can tell you that this is precisely the pattern the Lord is diligently seeking to establish in your life right now, so that heaven may not be a strange place to you later.

Hell is filled with human will,

heaven is filled with His will.

Hell is a place where people are free to continue to exert their defiance, but know for sure, “there’s no peace for the wicked.”

Heaven is for those who have gone through Gethsemane with their Lord and have emerged proclaiming, “Not my will, but yours be done, O Lord!” The strange thing about reverent submission is that in the releasing process we become fully human, not less. And when we stubbornly refuse to submit, hoisting our clenched fist defiantly into the air, we become ugly and something less than fully human.

So incredible and earth-shaking was our Lord’s obedience to His Father that the early church expressed it in story, teaching, poetry, visions, and songs. Perhaps one of the best known songs is the Christ-Hymn in :

2:5 You should have the same attitude toward one another that Christ Jesus had, 2:6 who though he existed in the form of God did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, 2:7 but emptied himself by taking on the form of a slave, by looking like other men, and by sharing in human nature. 2:8 He humbled himself, by becoming obedient to the point of death —even death on a cross! 2:9 As a result God exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 2:10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow —in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 2:11 and every tongue confess to the glory of God the Father that Jesus Christ is Lord.

This early hymn—which probably circulated in the church before Paul picked it up—is about Christ’s suffering and glory. It begins with the command to let the spirit of the hymn resonate in your bones, to let God’s will coarse freely through your veins, even if it costs you your life (v. 5).

The song can be broken down into two basic parts,

vv. 6-8 and vv. 9-11, which together develop the twin themes of suffering and exaltation. In 2:6-8 the hymn’s melody sounds a bitter-sweet note about Christ’s willing submission, suffering, and humiliation. In

2:9-11, the hymn breaks forth with jubilant sounds, filling the room with the sweet music of Christ’s exaltation and subsequent reign. Do you see the pattern? First, willing obedience through suffering and then glorious exaltation through God’s power..

Did you notice the comment “even death on a cross” in v. 8? It seems that this was Paul’s own addition to the hymn and clearly focuses our attention not only on Jesus’ willingness to die, which itself expresses the fathomless depths of his piety and unflinching faithfulness (), but his willingness to endure the shame and humiliation of a cross. He was put to death as a common criminal. And yet the ignominy of his death draws special attention to the majestic beauty of his obedience in Gethsemane. Golgotha’s battle was won not on that hill, but in a garden the night before: “Not my will, but yours be done!” Indeed, what was lost in a garden (Eden) was won back—and more—in a garden.