The Joy of Surrender

I tend to resist surrendering to Divine will because, on the one hand, we are told God is loving, and on the other we’ve heard stories like the one about Him asking Abraham to sacrifice his son. So which is He, and why would we risk our future with one as unpredictable and as crazy as that? I don’t know how to reconcile the God I have come to know with the one described in the Bible. In my experience, surrendering to Divine will has always led to an outcome that is more glorious than any I would expect for myself.

My most recent experience with surrender came when my husband’s business took him to Puerto Rico—a place I’d never even thought of vacationing—so I was less than thrilled at the prospect of moving there. My husband kept trying to convince me to move, but I resisted until my mom, who had died less than a year ago, appeared to me in a vision to say that moving me to Puerto Rico was her gift to me.

Gift or not, I didn’t want to move unless it was aligned with my highest good so I gave the entire move, along with where to live, to God. I gave Him a long and ridiculous list of demands assuming that it would be satisfied only if I were meant to move. The property should be safe, have water views, have large outdoor terraces, lots of light and a very low price, something not usually associated with such properties. God fulfilled His end of the bargain. It was the first property we saw, and I knew it. However, being the doubter, I waited three days and saw numerous other properties before making an offer.

The stories of old are the reason I have had such a difficult time surrendering, yet when I do, I find that God actually knows what He is doing. Once I got over my resistance and surrendered to Puerto Rico I found an embracing culture, surrounded by the warm, crystalline blue-green waters of the Caribbean I’d always longed for but never dreamed I’d have in my backyard. Spending weekends in the sun swimming and dancing has brought me more joy than I would dare ask for—or even knew I was missing—as has the prospect of escaping winter in the Northeast.

My move was just the latest in an ongoing thread of miraculous opportunities woven into the fabric of my daily life once I decided to surrender to Divine will. Once I opened to the possibility that there might be an Organizing Force in the universe and decided to ride on Its Jet-stream, I delight in how easily life can flow and relish in the joy that follows.