The White Flag of Surrender

My wife and I were sitting on the couch one evening when the conversation turned to travel. This is tricky territory because, while traveling is not at the top of my list of personal values, it so happens that Tamarah’s middle name is Wanderlust. I’m pretty sure if I came home from work today and told Tamarah I received a vision from God that we’re supposed to move to Madagascar, she would have her bags packed within the hour.

On this evening, we were discussing an overseas trip that would likely be a once-in-a-lifetime tour for us. Tamarah got excited at the thought, stood up and walked over to the computer table. Within a minute, she found some ridiculously priced round trip tickets from GSP to The Dream. She turned around from the computer table to face me and said something like, “Those are some crazy prices right there.” I said, “No kidding,” but then dropped it since I don’t make big decisions like that spontaneously.

As I’ve noted in other posts, I have Helper traits and my wife has Leader traits. What that looks like in this instance is I need time to process the opportunity while Tamarah is ready to tap the purchase icon right now. On my account, we waited.

Two or three evenings later, we were sitting on the couch again when the topic of that trip came up. Without saying a word, Tamarah got up to check the status of those ticket prices. With her back to me, I could see the computer screen come to life. The computer is on a table fifteen feet from where I sit, so I cannot see the details. Based on what Tamarah did next, I assume the ticket prices must have doubled or tripled and put the trip out of reach.

She took her little fist and, like a bolt of lightning, gave the computer table a single, solid strike. The crack of thunder that came with it made our napping dog jump and slink off to another room. I can hear Jael say from the cloud of witnesses, “You go, girl.”

I do not want to resent or punish my wife for having Leader traits. As I noted last month, Leaders get a lot of value by moving things along. That’s a strength. Leaders make the world go around. But the weakness, or shadow side of that strength, is that Leaders have problems with varieties of anger. Leaders, for example, are not the most patient people in the world.  

If that evening of missed travel opportunity had happened twenty years ago, Tamarah would have stayed angry for a day or two. Not so much anger with me but at herself—that she should have trusted her initial instincts to pull the trigger at the sight of those first tickets.  

Now comes the beautiful part. No more than thirty seconds after Tamarah hit the table, still seated with her back to me, I saw her tanned shoulders rise and then, slowly, lower along with an audible exhale. She then stood up, came over and sat down beside me on the couch. And then in the most contented way said, “I guess the Lord has something else in mind.” And I replied, “I guess so.”

What happened in those few minutes? In counselor-therapy speak, what Tamarah did there is called self-regulating. I’m comfortable using that terminology. Self-regulating is a good term and useful. Take a moment, inhale deeply and exhale slowly. Relax the tension. But I also think that’s low-resolution. It doesn’t reveal the details of an internal shift of functional trust.

A high-resolution assessment from a Gospel-relational orientation would call what Tamarah did a moment of practiced surrender.

Let me break it down. When I think of all the gifts and talents that work for Leaders—determined, self-sufficient, pain-tolerant, problem-solver, high resilience—those abilities can also work against Leaders. How? By placing too much confidence and trust in themselves. By taking a situation and just working it and working it and working it until something finally works out.

On the surface, that’s impressive. Below the surface, there is often a personal and/or relational expense that is costly. Some species of anger is the most common tool. Some degree of detachment and alienation is often the result.

At the bottom is a functional trust in the self. A trust in one’s abilities, in one’s competencies, in one’s capacities, in one’s vision for what could be. For what should be. And yet, it appears God would have all of that. At moments along life’s way, God will give Leaders opportunities to surrender. It’s no small task and often messy—the conquering of a person’s heart.

Last month I referenced Peter as a case study for leader traits, and I’ll do so again in this case to make the point. In Luke 5, Jesus steps into Peter’s beached fishing boat, asks to be pushed out just a bit, and begins teaching those who are following him. After wrapping up the teaching, Jesus tells Peter and his partners to take the boat out into the deep water and let down their fishing nets. Peter’s reply is revealing:

“Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing; nevertheless, at your word I will let down the net” (6:5, NKJV). Can you hear the internal wrestling match Peter is having between trusting his native abilities and surrendering the moment to Jesus? Toiled! Caught nothing. Toiled more!  We’ve fished this lake our entire lives! Just not our day. Nevertheless…

That “nevertheless” is what I’m calling surrender. It’s a white flag that will need to be run up the pole of a Leader’s life over and over again. Definitively, yes, when a Leader first trusts in Jesus. And then repeatedly as the Leader practices trusting Jesus with more and more of one’s life.

Like Peter’s tongue—quick and sharp—as is often the case with Leaders. Because of this, Peter received more rebukes from Jesus than any of the other disciples. Yet this is Jesus loving Peter by forming Peter like clay in the hands of the Potter. Not all at once, but over Peter’s lifetime.

All of this gets me thinking about the little church I grew up attending and one of the hymns we would sing. The hymn is entitled, “Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus.” A line in the chorus goes, “Jesus, Jesus, how I trust Him, how I’ve proved Him ‘or and ‘or.”  

When Tamarah said to me, “I guess the Lord has something else in mind,” that was just a recent evidence that she, like Peter long before her, has learned to trust Jesus, to surrender to Him, by proving Him over and over as trust-worthy. Sometimes the trust comes quickly, at other times slowly. Sometimes the trust comes easily, at other times after a battle.

Because surrender is not giving up but letting Jesus in.