And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them-Mal. 3:17. What is the surrender of the man that receives the love of God? In what region of my nature is that giving up of myself most imperative and blessed? In my will. The will is the man. The center-point of every human being is the will, and it is no use for us to talk about our having given ourselves to God, in response and in thankfulness to His gift of Himself to us, unless we come and say, "Lord, not my will, but thine" [Luke 22:42]; and bow ourselves in unreluctant and constant submission to His commandments and to His will. We give ourselves to God when, moved by His giving of Himself to us, we yield up our love to Him; and love never rests until it has yielded up its will to the Beloved. He indeed gives, asking for nothing; but He gives in a still deeper sense, asking for everything-and that everything is myself. And I yield myself to Him in the measure in which I cast my thankful love upon Him, and then bow myself as His servant, in humble consecration, to Himself, with all my heart and soul and mind and strength. "They shall be my people" [Jer. 24:7]. That is wonderful! It is strange that we can imitate God, in a certain fashion, in the gift of self; but it is yet more strange and blessed that God accepts that gift, and counts it as one of His treasures to possess us. One of the psalmists had a deep insight into the miracle of the Divine condescension when he said, "He was extolled with my tongue" [ Ps. 66:17]. Strange that the loftiest of creatures should be lifted higher by the poor, tremulous lever of my praises; and yet it is so. He takes as His such poor creatures, full of imperfection and tremulous faith and disproved love, as you and I know ourselves to be, and He says, "My people." "They shall be mine" [Gen. 48:5]; my jewels, says He, "in the day which I make." Oh! It sometimes seems to me that it is more wonderful that God should take me for His than that He should give me Himself for mine. Have you given yourself to Him? Have you begun where He begins, taking first the gift that is freely given to you of God, even Jesus Christ, in whom God dwells, and who makes all the Godhead yours, for your very own? Have you taken God for yours, by faith in that Lord "who loved me, and gave Himself for me" [Gal. 2:20]? And then, smitten by His love, and having the chains of self melted by the fire of His great mercy, have you said: "Truly I am thy servant . . . thou hast loosed my bonds" [Ps. 116:16]? You never own yourself till you give yourself away; and you never will give yourself to God, to be His, unless, with all your heart and strength, you cling to the rock-truth, that God has given Himself to every man that will take Him, in Jesus Christ, to be that man's God forever and ever. In Celebration of Life in Him, Dr. Jim DeBruhl, gembeaux@bellsouth.net
