Freedom Blog

Over these past few months Jesus has been challenging me to really wrestle with this question: “Am I truly submitting to His lordship over my life and His headship over the church?” For me when I think lordship what immediately comes to mind is trust. When I am living a life submitted to the lordship of Christ, it means that I trust Jesus knows what’s best for me. Now, I’m not saying that I need to be at a place where I immediately accept and embrace everything Jesus brings into my life (if that were true, I’d probably be sporting a halo and have wings). No, what I am alluding to here is the resistance and doubt that I have in my heart when it comes to believing and waiting on His plans for my life. It’s when I try to circumvent or even try to answer my own prayers that I reject Jesus’ lordship over my life.

It’s the same with submitting to Jesus’ headship over the church. I was just talking with a fellow brother about his church back in Australia which is a “Presence” driven church. This resonates with me. A “Presence” driven church actively moves in the gifts of the Holy Spirit and allows Him to orchestrate the flow of the service.  I do feel like part of the process of submitting to Jesus’ headship over the church is to be more “Presence” driven. My only concerns are (and this is what I am wrestling in my heart about) “Am I fearful of giving up control of the Sunday gathering because I want to be in control?” Now this can flesh out in a variety of ways: 1) I’m afraid of chaos happening; 2) I’m afraid that the Word will get lost; and 3) I’m afraid of what may happen (supernaturally). Now what these three concerns have in common are: mistrust and control. So, again I am drawn back to submitting to the lordship of Christ (trust) and headship of Christ (control). Of course both of these issues could be interchangeable with control being at odds with lordship and trust hindering headship.

So, where to from here? I’m still in process, but, bottom line, I know that these are good wrestlings. And no matter how long I wrestle, I know that I am growing and maturing in this process. A friend said to me once, “Struggle is good, it’s when there’s no struggle that we should be concerned.” Now, how I’ve always interpreted this is: Struggle shows that I am either in the process of transformation or that I have been transformed by God and am now in the process of walking in that transformation by struggling to not revert back to my old ways of living. It’s when I’ve either grown complacent where I am completely uninterested about being transformed by God or when I have given into my carnal selfish desires which hardens my heart and makes me indifferent and unresponsive to God’s movements of redemption that struggle ceases. This is when there needs to be concern. But, when there’s struggle, this means I am actively joining with Jesus as He fights for my freedom.

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