I Surrender All

“Whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:38-39 NRSV)

“I Surrender All” was written by Judson Wheeler Van De Venter, an artist and musician from Michigan. After he felt God leading him to switch his career to evangelism, he fell to his knees and prayed: “Lord, if you want me to give my full time to Thy work, I’ll do it, I surrender all to Thee.”¹ He would later write this hymn in remembrance of that experience. What does it mean to “surrender all”? Are you willing to “surrender all?"

“Surrender is an odd word. In common usage, there is no sense of the word that has positive connotations. We surrender our legal rights in contractual disputes. We surrender ourselves to loss and grief. And although surrendering ourselves to our enemies in war may in fact save lives—even our own—deep down we know that what we have surrendered is our dignity, our pride. To surrender is to diminish ourselves; to become less than what we were.

Yet for Christians, it is in the essence of this word that we find redemption and renewal. It should tell us something about the God we serve that even language itself becomes redeemed through the cross of Christ. To the believer, words like ‘less,’ ‘weak,’ die,’ and ‘surrender’—words that normally denote failure—convey instead the very life of God. But if language itself undergoes conversion, it is only because there is real, ontological change that occurs when God acts.”²

1. Morgan, Robert. Then Sings My Soul. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2003) pg. 239.
2. Schulz-Widmar, Russell, editor. Praises Abound. (New York: Church Publishing, 2012) pp. 45-46.

All to Jesus I surrender
All to Him I freely give;
I will ever love and trust Him,
In his presence daily live.

I surrender all, I surrender all;
All to thee, my blessed Savior,
I surrender all.

All to Jesus I surrender,
Humbly at His feet I bow,
Worldly pleasures all forsaken,
Take me Jesus, take me now.

I surrender all, I surrender all;
All to thee, my blessed Savior,
I surrender all.

(Judson Wheeler Van De Venter)