Philippians 4:4-8
“Surrender Brings Peace”
By: Rev. Kenneth Sauer, Pastor of Parkview United Methodist Church, Newport News, VA
While driving around town, one thing I enjoy doing, is reading church marques or signs.
Some of them may seem silly, some I may not be able to apply to my life, and some are downright
unbiblical and theologically incorrect.
For example, in Macon, Georgia there was a Methodist Church which had a sign that read: “Jesus is coming
soon so look busy!”
I don’t know what the people who put those words on that sign were thinking...
...Were they trying to be funny?...
...Were they serious?....
...Were they legitmately telling us some great truth in a sarcastic way?...
...I don’t know, but they sure left it up for a long time.
....But that aside, more often than not, the words on church marques are convicting and thought
provoking.
One of them that I have read several times this past week while driving up Jefferson Avenue reads:
“Surrender Brings Peace.”...and I agree with these words one hundered percent!....that is, depending on what
we are surrendering too.
In our Epistle lesson for this morning Paul talks about a “peace...which transcends all understanding.”
And I would imagine that many of us here today can in some degree relate to what Paul is referring too.
Because this passage is speaking to Christian believers, not to unbelievers.
Unbelievers do not have this peace....and have never felt this peace.
There is no peace...no real peace outside the peace which comes from a personal relationship with the
living and forgiving One and Only Almighty God!
Unbeleivers do not have peace with God, and therefore unbelievers do not have peace.
Unbelievers reject, question, deny, curse, and oppose God....and no matter how mild the unbeliever’s
questioning and rejecting might be--it is still questioning and rejecting---and this is not peace!!!
But when a person surrenders all they have and all they are--their entire lives to God---peace is made
between them and God.
Peace rules both within and between the person and God.
In fact, God causes a flood of peace to surge through the heart and life of the new believer...and this is what
new believers have been experiencing for two thousand years!!!!
We all have this common experience.
The question is this: once we have the peace of God flooding our lives, how do we maintain that peace?
This is where things can get tricky....
...this is where that “transcends all understanding” stuff comes in.
I don’t care who we are, where we live, the color of our skin, the language that we speak, whether our hair
is curely, straight or thin....even though we are saved through surrendering our lives to Christ we still all have to live
in this fallen world!...
...and in living in this fallen world....we all still have to deal with outside forces which try to bring us down...
...with the aching pain of impoverished people walking the streets without a place to sleep or a good thing to eat...
...with friends, neighbors, and family members who do not yet believe in Christ and can’t understand...or won’t
accept our message...
...with pain that comes to our bodies, and death that comes to our loved ones...
....with loneliness....old age....lost friendships...tight finances...and I guess I could spend the entire morning into
the night and into the next day listing the problems which tear at our hearts and minds and try to undermine the
peace which only comes from God!
Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”....
.... “Peace I leave with you;” says Jesus to His followers, “my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the
world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”
So how do we maintain the peace which transcends all understanding?
In verses 4 and 5 of our Epistle lesson Paul writes to the Christains at Philippi: “Rejoice in the Lord always.
I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything,
but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”
And he follows this by saying that when we do this we will have the peace of God which transcends all
understanding.
In essence, he’s saying that when we surrender everything....all that stuff that gets between us and
peace--to God...well this is what brings us peace!
When we say, “Lord it’s out of my hands...it’s beyond my ability to cope with...I give it to You....that is
when we are able to have peace.
Think of it this way....
...how did we come to the saving knowledge that Christ is the Way to salvation in the first place?
Was it through our own wisdom?
Was it by taking things into our own hands?
Were we saved through the wisdom of the world?
Were we saved by doing things our way?
No. We were saved by humbling ourselves, deciding that it is impossible for us to save ourselves, and
surrendering our entire selves to God.
Of course, it is possible for us to be like the one who recieved the seed that fell among the thorns, but the
worries of this life, the deceitfulness of this life choked us to the point where we lost the peace we recieved at
salvation.
Have you ever been so deceived?
I sure have!
So often, we as Christians put out the flame of peace by following a way which seems to be right by
human standards....by human wisdom....or whatever....but it is not the right way!
And then, and then....
...we find that we are in a miserable--peaceless situation...a real snare of the devil....and if we don’t surrender all
to God at this point....well....we will not regain peace until we do!
In our Epistle lesson Paul tells us: “Do not be anxious about anything.”
Paul is not talking here about the anxiety that many of us have to cope with due to some kind of medical
condition or mental handicap.
Science has come a long way in helping us overcome inborn anxiety problems through therapy and
medication.
The kind of anxiety Paul is referring to comes to us needlessly when we take things into our own
hands.
As we talked about last week, the Christian life is about the constant concious dependence upon Christ
for everything!
This means that the more we depend on Christ---the more we are aware of our
shortcomings... the more we realize that we must depend on Christ even more!!!!
And this means that we must be in the continual and intentional motion of surrendering all to God.
When a problem comes our way, seek God.
When we don’t have the answers, seek God.
When we are trying to figure out which way to turn, seek God.
When we are in a troubling situation, and we don’t know how to handle it--seek God--surrender to
God!!!
When we have made a mistake....or if we don’t even know that we have made a mistake...but we are
not at peace....seek and surrender to God!!!!....
...by prayer and petition....by prayer and petition.
When Christ is talking in our Gospel lesson for this morning about keeping ourselves from worry....He
basically says---Don’t worry!....
.... “But seek first” God’s “kingdom” and God’s “righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.”
God has set before us the right Way. It is the Truth. It is the Only true Light.
There is a narrow way and a broad way.
There is a right way and a wrong way.
There is our way and there is God’s way!!!...
....And thanks be to God!!!...
...“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!”
Because there is a Way!!!!!
There is a Way!!!!
Surrender to God and you will find peace!
God is for us, not against us.
God is the Father waiting for the prodigal son to surrender and return home!
And when that son returns, God runs out to meet the son, and throws a party!
God is the One who will leave the ninety-nine sheep on the hills and go look for the one that wandered
off...
For as Jesus says, it is not God’s will that any of us should be lost!
Paul wrote this letter to the Philippians from prison.
The Romans had put him in prison for preaching Christ!
He writes in the letter that he is “in chains for Christ.”
....but the letter is about rejoicing in the Lord!
....the letter is about the peace of God which transcends all understanding!
Paul writes: “Yes, and I will continue to rejoice!”
Paul was an educated man....
...Paul was a citizen of Rome....
...Paul had been a Pharisee...
...Paul had been someone who was in charge...
...someone who the ‘world’ looked up to...
...he had been a success by any worldly standards...
And here he was....not depending on his own intellect....
....not full of pride and self-centeredness...
....not saying, “Hey man, I’m a Roman citizen for crying out loud! Unlock these chains!”
And how was Paul able to keep himself from doing this...to keep himself at peace?
He was able to do this only through continually surrendering all he had and all he was to Christ....having
no confidence in the flesh....
“I consider everything a loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to
the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them
rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own...”
In other words, “I surrender all.”
Have we surrendered everything to Christ?
Do we have that peace which transcends all understanding?
What is most important in life?
How do we achieve peace?
Remember the words of the prophet Micah:
“With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with a thousand rams, with ten thousand rivers of oil?
Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
He has showed you, O man, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”
And this my friends, this and this only is what brings the peace that so many yearn for, but because we
are so blinded by our own ideas, our own egos, our own interests, our own anger we so easily miss out on it!
In her book: The Hiding Place, Corrie Ten Boom a Christian who survived the German Concentration
camps during World War 2 (but lost much of her family) is a person who had to surrender to God in order to
find this peace.
After the war was over, she spent much of her time speaking in churches.
After a church service in Munich, Germany she recognized a former S.S. man who had stood guard at one
of the camps.
“He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. ‘How grateful I am for your
message, Fraulen.’ he said. ‘To think that, as you say, He (Christ) has washed my sins away!”
Corrie writes, “His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the
people...about the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.
Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for
this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.
I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth
or charity. And so again I breathed a silent paryer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me your forgiveness.
As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my
hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost
overwhelmed me.”
It doesn’t make human sense, but it does make God-sense!
“In everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace
of God which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
