4 Sermon Illustrations on Surrender to Christ

A Korean Christian showed that he had grasped the meaning of the injury caused by anger when he got up in prayer meeting and said, "I heard the missionary say that every burst of anger pierced the heart of Jesus. So I hung a picture of the Lord Jesus on my wall, and every time I lost my temper, I put a thorn on that picture. The picture was soon covered with thorns. A great love welled up in me that He should suffer because of my temper; now He gives me grace in temptation. I say, 'Not I, but Christ within me,' and His sweetness comes instead of my bad temper."

When Henry VIII. had determined to make himself head of the English Church, he insisted upon it that convocation should accept his headship without limiting and modifying clauses. He refused to entertain any compromises, and vowed that "he would have no tantums ," as he called them. Thus when a sinner parleys with his Saviour he would fain have a little of the honour of his salvation, he would save alive some favourite sin, he would fain amend the humbling terms of grace—but there is no help for it, Jesus will be all in all, and the sinner must be nothing at all. The surrender must be complete, there must be no tantums , but the heart must without reserve submit to the sovereignty of the Redeemer.