Perhaps one of the hardest truths to accept in the area of surrender is that we can’t do it! If we could work on surrender, we wouldn’t have to surrender. If we could do something, then we wouldn’t have to surrender. Because surrender, or giving up, is admitting that we can do nothing. Inevitably, therefore, the work of bringing us to the point of surrender must be the work of God. It is not something we can do for ourselves.

As we have noticed earlier, the devil has prepared sidetracks at every step for the one who becomes aware of his need of Christ and decides to come to Jesus. He says, “You are a sinner, and you have no righteousness. That’s right-go to work on your righteousness.” And we can spend futile days and years trying to produce righteousness by willpower.

Then we hear about the truth that righteousness comes only by faith, and the devil jumps in and says, “That’s right, you need faith. Start working on your faith.”

And after we come to understand that faith is a gift, not our own work, he meets us again at the last step in coming to Christ, surrender, and says, “OK, now what you need to do is to try hard to surrender.”

Sometimes parents and teachers and ministers and other church leaders have unwittingly helped the devil in his campaign! Have you ever been to a meeting where a minister or a teacher invited you to work hard on surrender? Have you ever seen, perhaps, a little altar up front with a little fire going and slips of paper handed up and down the aisles? And you write the sin that you want to give up on the piece of paper and take it up and put it in the fire. Is that surrender?

Have you ever wondered how to rid yourself of some sin in your life and have someone tell you that all you have to do is give it up? And you try giving it up. You say the words. You say, “I give up my dishonesty,” or “I give up my evil thoughts.” You pray the words. But you find that dishonesty and evil thoughts are still with you.

The Bible uses the analogy of the crucifixion as a symbol of the experience of surrender.

“I am crucified with Christ,”

Paul says. Galatians 2:20. Jesus used the symbol repeatedly, inviting His followers to take up their cross and follow Him.

See Matthew 10:38 Luke 14:27; Mark 8:34.

In fact, whenever Jesus spoke of the cross, He always referred to it as our cross, never His own.

Think for a minute about crucifixion. How was it accomplished? That’s easy to remember, isn’t it? How many times have we seen the artwork and heard about the nails and the wood? But notice one thing particularly. You cannot crucify yourself. Someone else has to do it for you.

If you want to kill yourself, you can do it any number of ways. You can put a gun to your head and pull the trigger. You can jump off the Golden Gate Bridge or the Empire State Building. You can take an overdose of sleeping pills, or lock yourself in your car in the garage with the motor running. People have tried all sorts of methods with greater or lesser success. But no one has ever yet been able to commit suicide by crucifying himself.

Christ’s Object Lessons expresses it this way,

“No man can empty himself of self. We can only consent for Christ to accomplish the work.” - Page 159.

How do we consent for Christ to do the work? It involves more than just saying or praying the words.

“The lips may express a poverty of soul that the heart does not acknowledge. While speaking to God of poverty of spirit, the heart may be swelling with the conceit of its own superior humility and exalted righteousness. In one way only can a true knowledge of self be obtained. We must behold Christ.” - Ibid.

As we make the choice to spend time day by day in beholding Christ, as we invite Him to do His work in our lives, He will lead us step by step to the point of surrender. Giving up is possible only when He has brought us up to that point.