Surrender

My name is Tony. For those of you guys who don’t know me, I’m one of the ministers here on staff, and it’s a great honor to be able to preach to you on this Easter morning. Easter is like the Super Bowl of Christianity. It’s important and it’s not lost on our team that there are many places you could have brought your family this weekend. I just want to say from the onset of this lesson that I took a fair bit of time trying to craft for everyone here a thought from the words of God that would both be inspiring and challenge our thinking and hopefully would also draw us nearer to Christ and to his gospel. But I wanted to make sure that you felt that it had practical value because really the way that we examine this book that we so love, it’s that we look at it and we realize that it changes our whole heart. This morning we are going to look at a passage that hopefully will have some practical value for you as we come together and celebrate this moment. Christians throughout the world for 2,000 years have been celebrating this moment.

As I mentioned in my prayer, the followers of Jesus, they went to go visit his burial site. When they went to go visit, what they were expecting to find was what you expect to find when you go to visit a burial site. They expected to find a man laying in a tomb. That’s what they were hoping for, rather, that’s what they were expecting. They were hoping to pay homage to their dead friend, their dead teacher, and their dead Lord. But what happened is when they went to go visit the tomb, instead of seeing a dead body in a cave, they saw that the tomb was empty and Jesus was not there. Eye witnesses to this very event, who would eventually give their lives for what they saw, saw that the one that was killed had come back to life. This event became for those followers and then for followers all throughout the world in all time, an illustration of Christ’s power over humans’ greatest enemy. Our greatest enemy is death. It was a moment that could express the great finality of the idea that Jesus had the power over darkness, death, hell, and the grave.

And so today, millions of people gather in churches throughout the world to worship the King above all Kings, the one who rose again. So for us, Christmas… Rather, Easter is like our July fourth. It’s the victory over our greatest enemy. But in that, what happens is that churches this morning are filled to the brim. Ministers like me throughout the world are trying to compel people who come once a year to come back and then to come back again and then to stick around. I want to lay my cards on the table. Today, I’m trying to speak in a way, hopefully, that will show you the beauty and the practicality of the biblical account so that you will want to come back, dive deeper, and learn from this great book. That’s the challenge for me today to present to you something so beautiful that hopefully you look at it and you go, Wow, Jesus, this person that these people honor with their lives makes sense to me. I want to also give him a shot. So that’s what I’m hoping to do. I’m trying to convince you, just so we’re clear. I’m like a bad car salesman.

But anyway, I have the best thing ever that I’m trying to present to you, though. So let’s dive in. Matthew 26 is where we’re going to be. And don’t worry, if you don’t have a Bible, all the scriptures we’re going to read are going to be up on the screen. And also all the relevant points will be up on the screen. Matthew 26 is where we’re going to be. Here’s the question I want to start out with. Well, we’ll get to that in a second. In Matthew 26, we’re entering the last night of what we call the passion week. In the text, we’re going to read it’s late Thursday night, possibly into early Friday morning. It’s been quite a jam packed week for Jesus and his followers. The Sunday that preceded the events we’re going to read tonight, Jesus comes in crowned as King. He’s riding a colt and these people lay before him some palm branches and he’s ushered into Jerusalem. People are shouting, hosanna, blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna means pray, save us. They look to this Messiah, this Jesus, and they say, Hey, this guy who’s coming in is going to be our savior.

Jesus comes in with this incredible celebration, but it’s short lived because on Monday, Jesus walks into the temple courts and flips over all of the moneychagers and drives out all of the people who were turning his father’s house into a den of thieves. That did not encourage the religious leaders of the time. In fact, they were quite distraught by what he did. So Jesus doubles down all day Tuesday, all day Wednesday. Jesus spends two days in Jerusalem and just rebukes the tar out of these religious leaders. Some of the most intense rebukes in all of the Bible are found in those two days. It’s so bad that by Wednesday night, Jesus has to hide because they want to arrest him. So Jesus hides and decides to take his band of brothers, these men, these disciples into a small room where he has what we call the last supper, where Jesus prays and gives some final instructions for his disciples. We have the scene that we’re going to read in a moment coming immediately after that. But then after the scene, we’re going to read in a moment, Jesus is arrested. Jesus is killed on Friday.

He lay in a tomb on Saturday and then is resurrected on Sunday morning. But here in Matthew 26, it’s still Thursday. Jesus knows exactly what’s coming. He knows the agony of the abuse he’s about to receive. He understands the pain he’s going to endure on the cross. He understands the torture that’s about to come to him. He understands all of it. So Jesus takes his disciples with him to a place called Gethsemane. Gethsemane, it’s a garden east of Jerusalem, across the Kidron Valley, near a place called the Mount of Olives. Commentators tell us that the word Gethsemane, the place where Jesus is praying, it means the place of pressing. It’s an olive press. It’s where they would take the olives and press them so that olive oil could be extracted from them. And this is where Jesus goes to pray on the night before he is betrayed, or the night that he is betrayed, the place of pressing. Jesus is under severe pressure. Can you imagine, just for a second, knowing that you’re about to be tortured? Put that in your brain. In about three hours, you’re going to be tortured. How do you feel?

Can you imagine the stress? Can you imagine the anxiety you would feel? Here’s where we discover what we’re going to be exploring this morning. Here’s the simple question. What do you do when you’re under pressure? When you’re under stress, when you’re overwhelmed, when you’re tired, when you’re facing anxiety, fear, and uncertainty in the sense of the dullness of life, what do you do? This week I surveyed, I don’t know, 100 people or so. It’s like survey says, about 100 people asking them what they do. You know what the top answers were? What do you do when you’re stressed? I didn’t say your spiritual answer. Just tell me what you want to do when you’re stressed. The top answer, shopping. I figured it would come from mainly the females of the group. It did not. It came from all types. The second answer, eating. Some people want to sleep, escape. Some people said, I just watch Netflix or jump on TikTok or watch some reels on Instagram. What do you do when you’re under severe pressure? I’d like to show you what Jesus did and then what Jesus taught his followers on the Eve of his death to do.

I promise you, I just want to say this, I promise you from the onset, if you learn this lesson and you live out this principle, you will be able to find yourself freed in the moments of overwhelming pressure. And then I’ll tie it into Easter and hopefully you’ll have a good time with your family. So here’s the sense. So here’s the scene. Jesus is about to die. He knows it. And here’s how it plays out. The story goes like this. Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, the place of pressing. And he said to them, sit here while I go over there and pray. He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee. These are his closest friends along with him. He says to his closest followers, Hey, look, I’m going to pray. I just need to pray. And the next verse tells us why he needs to pray. And he began to be sorrowful and troubled. This word means full of anxiety. Trouble, that’s what that word means, full of anxiety. Then he said to them, My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Another Gospel writer, Luke, tells us that his brow began to sweat mixed with blood.

And though it’s rare, there’s a phenomenon that happens, it’s well documented under great emotional stress, the tiny capillaries in the sweat glands can break, thus mixing blood with sweat. He’s under so much stress that his capillaries in his forehead break and he begins to sweat blood. Here’s what’s happening. He’s in extreme emotional agony. Then he says to the disciples, Stay here and keep watch with me. The Gospel writers point us not only to the story of Jesus, but also to the story of the disciples. The last scene in which we find Jesus with his disciples alone has two focuses. One is Jesus’ response in the midst of tremendous pressure, and the second is how these men respond to that same pressure. The contrast is quite profound. Jesus is in a time of pressing, and he’s going to pray to his father a mind blowing prayer. And these men, like many of us, are going to take a step that is quite human. We’ll get to it in just a second. Going a little further, he fell down, this is Jesus, with his face to the ground and prayed, My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me, yet not as I will, but as you will.

Jesus uses this cup illustration, this cup metaphor often. He asked his disciples another time, Can you drink the cup that I drink? It’s a metaphor for one’s destiny, for one’s purpose. Jesus, as the son of God, knows what he has been called to from eternity. Jesus has been called to die on a cross since the day he was thought of. Jesus, for eternity more, had been thought of or had been weaved into the plans of his father to die on a cross, to be slain. He knows what’s approaching. And in that moment, he is fully man. And so he says, Father, I don’t want to do what I’m supposed to do. You ever have that prayer? So could you take it away? The pressure is so great, he knows exactly what’s coming. He’s overwhelmed to the point of death. So he prays a prayer, Lord, take it away. Then he adds this line, Yet not as I will, but as you will. Here’s the question for you. Again, where do you go when you’re pressed or when you’re facing the pressure? Jesus prays. That’s where Jesus goes. It’s a very specific type of prayer that he goes to.

But just keep that in mind as we move towards the disciples. What do the disciples do? What do the disciples do? The disciples are dealing with the same pressure they have heard from their Messiah several times that he is going to die. Mark 9, verse 31 says, For he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, the son of man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill him. And when he is killed, after three days he will rise. The disciples understood Jesus was going to die. They felt the same pressure, maybe not exactly the same pressure, but certainly they felt the pressure. What do they do? What do they do? What do they do? Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. These men go to sleep. You ever been so stressed, so pressed, so overwhelmed, so riddled with anxiety that all you want to do is go to bed? These guys get that. It’s a common human thing. It’s a common human thing in the midst of the pressing to want to escape. This is what I think about this. It’s about escape. All of us do this.

I would imagine you do this, too. I don’t know how to deal with what I’m about to deal with, so I try to escape. I sleep, I drink, I get high, I consume a lot of TikTok, I watch my favorite show, I play my favorite game, I buy one more thing all to try to escape the pressing. You just got to hold your breath because you’re thinking, Maybe if I fall asleep when I wake up, all of this will go away. Maybe if I just consume this, at the end of the day, I’ll wake up and I’ll think, The problem is gone. I’m curious how many of us do that in the midst of our pressing. But I would imagine that that’s not the only place you go, I’m curious today how many of you run to another place, which is the place of control. You like this? Technically, it’s not control. A UCLA researcher called it the illusion of control because you actually have no control. Here’s the problem. I don’t know how to deal with all that life is throwing my way. Let me just try to hold on to it as tightly as possible.

But I don’t know about you, but the more that I try to control, the more I get a sense that I’m losing control. Then the more I try to control, and then the more I get a sense that I’m losing control. And the more I try to control, I’m losing control. All right, I don’t know what happened. Whatever. It’s a cycle, right? It’s the cycle of losing control. It’s the same with escapism, right? The more you try to escape, the more you feel the pressure because you know you can escape. So you do deeper and darker things. First, it was sleeping, and then it was like, Let’s just drink this problem away, or Let’s just Instagram this problem away, and then it just dives in and dives in and dives in and dives in. The thing is, once you come back to some sense of lucidity, you look up and you realize everything is exactly the same. There is no escape. There is no escape. There is no way to control. It doesn’t work. These men are doing what’s very natural. Their Lord is about to die and they just go to sleep. Jesus returns and notices that they’re sleeping and says this, Could you men keep watch with me for one hour?

He asked Peter, Watch and pray so you will not fall into temptation. The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. The flesh, that’s your human nature, the flesh. He’s saying you cannot rely on what you do naturally to bring you through this difficult time. I think that’s a message for us. You cannot rely on what you would do naturally to bring you through a difficult time. Instead, watch and pray. Who are we watching? Who are we watching? Well, if you want to learn, you have to watch. And who are we watching? Jesus. The idea here is you watch how he handles this so you can learn to handle it. Jesus is the best teacher, so watch how he does it and look at where Jesus runs. He does it a second time. He went away a second time praying, My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken unless I drink it, may your will be done. He says, If you can do it differently, God, if you can come up with something else, please do it. But not my will, not what I want, but what you want be done.

To those who run to control, to those who run towards escape, I hope that you will be willing to embrace this simple truth. It’s so simple. It comes right from this text. Hopefully, it’ll help you unpack a little bit of the struggles in your own life. Here’s the idea. You don’t have the capacity to control. You don’t. You can’t control it. You have no power. You don’t have the ability to escape. There is no way to go. But you always have the power to surrender. You can always surrender. This is what Jesus does. In fact, he prays the prayer a third time. He says, When he came back, he again found them sleeping because their eyes were heavy. So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. Then he returned to his disciples and said to them, Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour has come and the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinner. Rise, let us go. Here comes my betrayer. The scene is extraordinary. It begins with this incredible, oppressive emotional state, and it ends with this resilience and this readiness to move forward into Jesus’s destiny.

But it all begins with a simple word that all of us should learn. It begins with surrender. Jesus here teaches us surrender, and he asks us to watch and to do the same. Lord, what you want me to do, I do not want to do. Lord, would you change my destiny, change the plan, change my circumstances? But after I pray and I pray and I pray, I declare, May your will be done. Here’s what I want to encourage you with this morning. If you’re going through it, like life is out of control, it’s really down in the dumps and there’s no way out. Rather than running to the place that’s natural, running to your weak human nature, running to control and running to escape, maybe God is calling you right now to run to a place of surrender. Give it up. Trust in God’s plan, trust in God’s will. Let me just give you a little warning. If you ever tried to surrender, here’s an encouragement but a warning. Surrender isn’t easy. I don’t want to be like, Yeah, run, surrender, and everything will be wonderful. That’s a lie. Anybody who told you that is a liar.

It wasn’t easy for Jesus. In fact, it’s quite scary to surrender because you’re at the mercy of someone else. Jesus take the wheel isn’t like fun. It’s horrifying. You give up your dreams, you give up your desires, you give up the things that motivate you and you say, Hey Lord, what would you have me do? God does some crazy things. God shifts your whole life. As I mentioned, it’s not easy. What if you surrender to God’s will and you’re single for another 10 years? What if you surrender to God’s will and he doesn’t heal whatever is ailments in your life? What if you surrender the idea that this marriage that I’m in, though it’s difficult, I need to stick it and stick with it and stick with it and fight it out? What if God doesn’t heal your husband that has a demon or whatever? What if you give up what you think you should do and give it to God, and then God makes it really challenging. Look, here’s the encouragement. Following Jesus’s will, surrender isn’t easy, but who you’re surrendering to is good. As I mentioned, it wasn’t easy for Jesus. This is Easter, right?

Here’s how the story goes. You know the story, but let me tell you the story. Jesus never wronged a single soul. He never did anything wrong. He was completely without sin, totally holy and perfect in every single way. He surrenders to the will of God and so is betrayed by the people who he trusted. Handed over, beaten without mercy, he surrenders, Rise, here comes my betrayer. He gives himself over to a disciple that he had trained and raised. That man puts him basically into handcuffs, brings him to a court where people beat him. They wore these big signet rings and they pound his face in. So his face didn’t even look human anymore. They whipped him on his back, whipped him with glass and rocks embedded in him to the point where he would almost lose consciousness. And then after all that, they forced him to carry his own cross, drive stakes through his wrist and through his feet, stripped him naked, hung him as an innocent man on a cross, who all he had ever done is be just and kind to others, spat at him, cursed him. Here’s what’s interesting. Jesus actually had the power to control.

He had the power to escape. The Bible says he could have called down a thousand angels. You know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah? Big city destroyed by two angels. The Bible says he could have called down thousands, destroyed the whole world if he wanted to. He could have taken control, but instead he trusted in a good God. He chose surrender. In the ultimate act, in the ultimate act, he says, Into your hands, I commit my spirit. Surrender is not easy, but hold on, because three days later, our God showed that surrender isn’t easy, but who he surrendered to is good. So even though it all looked dismal, he turned it around and made something beautiful. And this is the historic understatement. And I want you to think about what this is, right? The women go to look for the person in the grave and he is not there. And what’s the theological point? What’s the point? Please hear this. By defeating death, hell, and the grave, Jesus ushers all of mankind into salvation or into an opportunity for salvation. One man’s surrender leads to the world’s chances at salvation. Death has been swallowed up in victory.

Where, oh death, is your victory? Where, oh death, is your sting? Do you see how this works? In the pressing, Jesus could have escaped and left everyone to suffer the pit of hell. Jesus could have said, I’m done. I’m not doing this. I’m not going to die for all you fools. He could have just been finished. And every single person here would be doomed to hell forevermore. He could have said, You know what? I’m not doing this. I’m taking control. I’m wiping the whole Earth out. I’m going to start brand new. And in doing that, he would have left every single one of us in our sin. But instead, he surrendered to the Father and so became a blessing for all who call on his name. He went into hell, slayed the ancient serpent, and comes back and says, Hey, there’s no more reason to fear for those who are in Christ Jesus. If Jesus hadn’t surrendered to the will of God, we were all doomed. So let me relate this to you. Remember, the disciples have been told to learn this lesson to watch, and here’s the point. Don’t try to escape the pressing. While my marriage is so hard, it’s so difficult, this whole thing is so challenging.

But here’s the thing. If you escape, you might be dooming your children to a lifetime of insecurity, anger, and fear. Don’t escape the pressing. Don’t try to take control because you really don’t even have control. And all that will happen in your life is you will have more anxiety and more fear and more anxiety and more fear. But instead, learn to live a life of surrender to the will of God, where you come before him and you say, Lord, I want this, but may your will be done. Here’s my question for you. What are you trying to escape that God wants you to surrender? You don’t have the capacity to control. You don’t have the ability to escape, but you will always have the power to surrender. The key is found in those eight beautiful words. Let your will… Sorry, yet not my will, but yours be done. Not my will, but yours be done. Not my will, but yours be done. In other words, real faith starts when you say to God, Hey, look, I really want this, Lord, but not as I will, but as you will. I want to be healed. I want a better job.

I want whatever, but not my will, but yours be done. Here’s an illustration. I’m going to do it. Just stick with me on this illustration. Can you bring out the thing? Oh, they brought it out already. These are Rubik’s Cubes. Rubik’s Cubes are quite complicated little puzzles. 40,000 ways to align this thing. I think about life a little bit like this. It’s super complicated. You’re like, Really, life looks more like it’s not like an order. It’s all messed up. Shane, you got this on the camera? Awesome. Yeah, you can come. Oh, look at me. All right, look, it’s really quite complicated. What happens in your life is you’re going to like, this is my marriage, this little blue dot here, and I want it to go over here because that’s where it’s supposed to be. But you have no idea how to move it there. So you’re just like, I actually did it by accident. But you have no clue. And even if you do it, the illustration continues, you do it by accident. You don’t actually know how to do it. Let me tell you what a life of control is. A life of control is I don’t know what I’m doing, so I just keep messing with it and am perpetually frustrated that I have no idea how to solve my own problems.

You look down, you’re like, This is failing me miserably. Let me tell you what escape looks like. Escape looks like this. This is a mess, but I’m going to go watch Netflix. No, I can’t make the illustration. Let me show you what surrender looks like. This is Mario. Mario, can you come on stage? This is surrender. Are you ready? Are you ready? Watch surrender. Mario, can you solve that for me? Here, go over here so they can see you solve it. I think I prefer surrender. By the way, Mario is so good at this thing that he could do a blindfold. I’m going to literally give it to him. This is not even part of the sermon. I just thought it would be cool for you to show it. I’m going to give it to him. He’s going to do a blindfold. Should I talk while he’s doing it or not? Just watch it. It’s cool. It’s one minute. Are you happy? No? All right, so never mind. I don’t even know I’m doing this. Here, you can watch him. He told me he can do it eight out of 10 times. So let’s see. Yeah, the pressure.

He said it takes about a minute and a half, so let’s just embrace it. I don’t even understand how someone could do this blindfolded. It feels like… Hey, good job, dude. But look, finish it. Just finish it. Just finish it. Yeah. So this is like the… Right. All of our lives, we’re just like, put this here. How do I raise my kids? I have no idea. The pressing is so intense. And we just double down on our own mistakes. Because every mistake in your life is your own doing. So it’s like, we just double down on it. Instead, it would be dope if you just learn to surrender. But here’s the cool thing about Jesus. Jesus is so awesome that what he does is he actually brings you into the process of life change. Mario is going to tell me how to solve the cube. Are you ready? All right, what do I do? Yeah. So L. This side down. F2. F forward two. Boom, boom. R. R. L. L dash. Up, up. U is under? Up, dash. This way? F2. Thank you, Mario. You’re amazing. Now, it’s him. You’re good. Mario is part of our team ministry and helped me out.

He’s awesome. Here’s the point. The points the same. You don’t have the capacity to control. You don’t have the ability to escape, but you always have the power to surrender. Look, whatever is pressing in on you, I want to encourage you to surrender it, to give it to God, who actually knows what he’s doing. Then he will, in turn, turn around and teach you how to manage your own life, how to manage it, how to think about it. I want to encourage you with this, if you’re brand new here, even Jesus needed to learn to surrender. The Bible says in Hebrews 5, During the last days of Jesus’ life, he offered up prayers and petition with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death. He was heard because of his reverent submission. Son, though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered. Once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him. Jesus had to learn it. You have to learn it. We need help along the way. If you’re new, I want to encourage you to get some help. We have these little connect cards on the back of your seat.

If you scan the QR code, we want to help you along the journey of faith. You could scan it, get some information. We want to just help you. You and I will have to learn to endure, learn to suffer, learn to surrender, learn so that at the end of it, we can be the source of goodness in God’s good world. The world needs more men and women who are willing to submit to God’s will and so that God can bring about through them the power of salvation for others. I’d like to ask you to be one of those people. Let’s pray for Communion.

Father, each week we have a moment where we take Communion, we take a little bit of bread that represents the body and a little bit of juice that represents the blood, and we do it in remembrance of Jesus’ death. But this morning, I pray we’ll do it in remembrance of his resurrection. That we will be reminded of the fact that Jesus was submissive to the point of death and then was given the name that is above every other name. That at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth.

And every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. That everyone will have to declare Christ’s kingship because of what he endured and then because of how he conquered death, hell and the grave. Today as we take communion, I pray we remember on this Easter morning what an amazing victory it was. I also pray, Lord, for all those who are struggling with control, struggling with escape, that you’ll give them some courage to take a first step, fill out a connect card, to be close to moving in the direction, to giving you their whole lives. Father, we just love you so much. We praise your holy name in Jesus name, Amen.