Romans 6 – Growing Up in the Lord https://growingupinthelord.com Surfing The Waves Wed, 11 Nov 2026 15:09:08 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.1.4 I Surrender All https://growingupinthelord.com/i-surrender-all/ https://growingupinthelord.com/i-surrender-all/#comments Mon, 08 Jan 2024 17:07:10 +0000 https://growingupinthelord.com/?p=4474 “All to Jesus I surrender, all to Him I freely give; I will ever love and trust Him, in His presence daily live.” Saying we love and trust Jesus is one thing. Daily practicing that love and trust is another. God is YHWH Jireh, our Provider. Yet we worry and fret and fuss about everything in our lives. Despite His track record, we “toil and spin” rather than trusting Him. Wouldn’t you rather live in His peace?
“All to Jesus I surrender, humbly at His feet I bow; worldly pleasures all forsaken, take me, Jesus, take me now.”
This verse ups the ante, doesn’t it? Humility and forsaking the world are counter-cultural concepts. Living as set apart often leaves us feeling alone and ready for the return of Jesus, but do we mean these words? The world will go on without us, but we have such a need for control. Could we let it go and pray this way?
“All to Jesus I surrender, Lord, I give myself to Thee; fill me with Thy love and power, let Thy blessing fall on me.”
The same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in us when we belong to Christ (Romans 8:11). When we surrender to Him in baptism, we are raised to walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4). Christians ought to be the most loving, joyful, active servants on the planet, but are we?
“I surrender all; all to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all.”
We must surrender to truly live. We aren’t walking in all the blessings of God if we are holding onto things of this world. God is in control, but we must surrender our attempts to control everything ourselves. Sometimes we don’t have because we either don’t ask or we’re too busy trying to do everything our way. Our journey of surrender is deeply personal, but Judson Wheeler Van De Venter’s words powerfully illustrate what surrender means. What do you need to give up so that you can truly live in the blessing of God’s provision? I created a memory verse packet around Ephesians 2:8–9, containing activity pages for the whole family to learn together. Download the free packet. ]]> https://growingupinthelord.com/i-surrender-all/feed/ 3 The Most Important Gift https://growingupinthelord.com/the-most-important-gift/ https://growingupinthelord.com/the-most-important-gift/#comments Mon, 25 Dec 2023 15:35:12 +0000 https://growingupinthelord.com/?p=4461 Christmas 1949 was likely an ordinary holiday, but for one particular couple, it was the beginning of a lifetime of tradition. This was their first Christmas as a married couple, one month before their first anniversary. A couple of eighteen-year-olds exchanged gifts. I don’t know what those first gifts were. His gift to her was wrapped in plain brown paper. She was so mad! How could he wrap it in plain paper? Was it just not worth the effort to find proper wrapping?

He got a kick out of her reaction, thus beginning a 70+ year tradition. He not only wrapped her gifts in brown paper, but he hid them, pulling them out as the last gift of the day. Her anger transformed into expectation. The contents of the humble packaging were often very valuable, usually jewelry or something special he knew she wanted but didn’t get for herself. In the later years, when the gathering family grew to 25–30 people, he discreetly added the brown box to her matriarchal pile of gifts. She still opened it last.

If you haven’t figured it out, this is another story about my grandparents. I learned so much from them. This brown paper packaging is no exception. It may even be one of the most important lessons. The best gifts are often hidden or disguised. After all, the Savior of the world entered the world in humble circumstances, born to a young woman and raised in a carpenter’s home. He lived without earthly wealth or status, even while teaching the crowds about the coming Kingdom. Isaiah 53 tells us He had no outward beauty to attract people, and He would be despised by many.

As the world remembers His birth, let us also remember the greatest gift of all: His sacrifice for our sins. Through Him, we can die to sin and be raised to walk in newness of life through baptism (Romans 6:3–4). Do you need to open His gift?

 

The holidays can bring joy and wonderful memories, but they can also bring difficult situations, complicated relationships, and unexpected emotions. I created the Holiday Survival Guide as a free, five-lesson Bible study to help navigate some of those challenges with God’s Word.

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