Synonyms: renounce, relinquish, dispense with, forswear, disclaim, disown, disavow, discard, wash one's hands of, give up, stop, cease, drop, forgo, desist from, have done with, abjure, abstain from, discontinue, break off, refrain from, set/lay aside, desert, leave, leave high and dry, turn one's back on, cast aside, break (up) with, vacate, quit, evacuate, withdraw from, surrender, cede, yield, indulge in, give way to, give oneself up to, yield to, lose oneself to/in, uninhibitedness, recklessness, lack of restraint, lack of inhibition, unruliness, wildness, impulsiveness, impetuosity, immoderation, wantonness
Antonyms: keep, claim, continue, stick by, self-control, power through, achieve, defend, bear, hope, acquire, quick visit, adopt, continue along, adhere, remain, pursue, support, take up, keep up, reuse, advocate, stay, persevere, cherish, keep going, carry on
Showing 1001 to 1025 of 1131 results
1001. “On the Way” to Jerusalem
Mark 9:33-37, Mark 9:38-41
One Volume
Gary M. Burge
... with embarrassed silence, for they were arguing who was the greatest. The placement of this story after the second passion prediction accentuates the contrast between Jesus and the disciples: he embraces humility, they argue who is greatest; he surrenders his life in service, they desire recognition and distinction. The second passion prediction is thus followed by a second misunderstanding. “Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve” (9:35). In sitting and summoning, Jesus assumes the role and authority ...
One Volume
Gary M. Burge
... sinful human beings. The twenty-four elders join the litany of the four cherubim with their own acts of worship. They fall prostrate and throw down their laurels before the enthroned one (4:9–10). In the ancient world, it was a common ritual for magistrates to surrender their crowns to pay homage to the emperor. Here the elders offer their crowns not to Caesar but to the Creator. At stake is the question: Who is the real Lord of the universe? Who has true power? In a hymn of their own, the elders proclaim ...
Sermon
Maxie Dunnam
... tried for years to gain that assurance of the Divine Love. He listened intently in prayer meetings to the testimony of those who had found it; he attended every revival meeting which came along; he followed the suggestions which others prescribed. He tried to surrender himself a thousand times. But nothing seemed to happen. He never seemed to find or feel what others did; and many nights in his little unplastered room under the rafters of his father’s farm house, he looked out through the windows at the ...
Sermon
King Duncan
... elephant’s foot, and the other end is tied to a huge banyan tree. The great elephant will pull with all its strength, but it won’t budge the banyan tree. After struggling against the tree and the chain for days and weeks the elephant finally surrenders. When that happens, the hunters can take the elephant and chain it to a little iron stake in the ground. The elephant will never attempt to pull away because it still associates the chain with the banyan tree. It never realizes how easily it could achieve ...
1005. Son of a Daddy
John 18:1-19:42
Sermon
Robert Leslie Holmes
... some crime against God, some sin that separated us from our maker. While we may not know what life looks like from the wrong side of a prison cell, the fact is that we are, many of us, still prisoners, trapped by whatever it is that keeps us from absolute surrender to Jesus. Like Barabbas, we may hide but we will not get out of this world alive. Listen to me, son or daughter of a father, my only hope and your only hope, the only hope of any Barabbas is to realize that another, the sinless Son of the Father ...
1006. Come Clean
Joel 2:1-2, 12-17
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... God. But what is difficult for us to learn and accept is what it takes for us to be free from sin’s shackles. What is difficult for us is to get our minds around the fact that returning to God with all of our heart is all about surrendering. It has been said that “genuine religious conversions are blessed defeats.”[3] This means that we must come clean, confessing and exposing our whole hearts to God, even those areas we have hidden away. We are called to do this not because God is angry that we have ...
1007. Falling Into Faith
Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... dark. But faith is response on our part to the inthrust of God.”[3] I believe this is what happened to Abraham. God “inthrusted” power and promise upon Abraham, and Abraham gave in and gave up. He finally arrived at the place where he waved the white flag of surrender and confessed that he needed God’s power more than he needed his own agenda. Sometimes it takes a great deal of time before we learn what it means to have faith. Why do you think we often hear of people who came to faith when they were ...
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... what God so desperately wants to give us. The truth of Jesus’ words come to life so that what we pray for we truly receive. It is a sacred surprise. Soon we begin to pray a prayer that God always answers with a yes: “Oh Lord, I surrender to your will. Nothing more. Nothing less. Nothing else!” A Picture of Prayer A colleague of mine knew two brothers growing up. They lived on a farm just outside of his neighborhood. They would often play together. Years later he ran into these two brothers in an ...
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... Response to Abuse So, now that we are clear on the evil reality of abuse, what is our response as loving Christians to such a huge problem? Find Healing and Hope in Christ. Only Jesus can give the love and power necessary to heal the abused and the abuser. Surrender to his love and care. Jesus said in Matthew 11:28 – “Come to me, all of you who are heavily burdened, I will give you rest.” Find a good counselor and find healing and hope. Abuse is not God’s Will, So Get Help! Abuse is always the fault ...
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... must come to the place where you are open to receive God’s help. This is the linchpin that holds all 12 step programs together. Step 2 – “Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.” No one ever finds freedom without surrendering to God’s love and power. No one! If you are addicted, your will power won’t save you. Your good intentions won’t save you. Your creativity won’t save you. Only God can save you. Paul proclaims this at the end of his passage about ...
Sermon
James L. Killen
... given a Nobel Prize for the work that she and her followers did among the destitute people who were left to die on the streets of the cities of India. Can you imagine a more depressing assignment than that? Yet she said: The spirit of our society is total surrender, loving trust, and cheerfulness. We must be able to radiate the joy of Christ, express it in our actions. If our actions were just useful actions that give no joy to the people, our poor people would never be able to rise up to the call we want ...
Sermon
Charley Reeb
... Jesus said, “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” You see, real life begins when we die to ourselves — when we die to control — when we die to our selfish desires and trivial plans. Real life in Christ begins when we surrender our ego, our pride, and our stubbornness. God can get started on us when we come to the place where we are free from the bondage of trite preoccupations and recognize that our only need is God. This is what it means to die. There are many who ...
Understanding Series
Robert H. Mounce
... him there, and God would supply his need. To discover for himself whether as the Son of God he was able to take care of himself would be an act of defiance against the Father. The first Adam had failed God by disobeying; the second Adam would surrender himself to the will of God in perfect obedience. Gerhardsson suggests that this temptation and the following two correspond to the three ways of loving God as charged in the Shema (Deut. 6:4; 11:13–21; Num. 15:37–41; heart, soul, strength) and expanded in ...
1014. Wedding Guests
Matthew 22:1-14
Sermon
Kristin Borsgard Wee
... thinking much about it. We showed up with our spiritual shirttails hanging out, lining up at the buffet table as if no one could see the ways in which we have refused to change and adapt to the desires of the king. Some of us have refused to surrender our fears and resentments. Some have refused to share their wealth. Some have refused to respect the dignity of every human being. These are the old clothes we wear to the king's banquet. These are the clothes we prefer to the wedding robe of new life, and ...
Understanding Series
Larry W. Hurtado
... should be titled the Parable of the Soils. The explanation of the meaning of the various soils is relatively clear. Some who become adherents of the message fail under persecution (4:16–17). Some are so tied to materialist priorities that they cannot really surrender to the message (4:18–19). It is perhaps the first group, the ones from whom Satan takes the message, that requires some comment. These are quite probably those who never even begin to receive the message properly, those who turn against it ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... his life. The preeminence of that encounter forever changed his orientation, and at a deeper level his self-understanding. Only one response could be appropriate to the overwhelming favor of God, and that was to allow Christ absolute claim over his life, and to surrender himself to a truth and to a task which alone were worthy of his existence. That truth was the gospel of God. Gospel in Greek comes from a compound word meaning “good report,” or as we say, “good news.” In saying that he was ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... and strive to overcome are also in themselves? It is no coincidence that we have learned more about the meaning of evil from the saints who have forsaken this world than from any number of moral idealists. Little is learned about temptation by surrendering to it; but whoever tries to resist evil learns its force firsthand. It is senseless to judge faults by degrees of badness. Left to themselves and given time, even seemingly innocuous faults become loathsome evils. Franz Leenhardt says it is futile to use ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... to obey the covenant and not merely to name it. There is a vast difference between the human will and the divine will. The former, according to Paul, is designated by outwardly, physical, and written code. These are human elements which, apart from the radical surrender of faith and the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, are but hollow echoes of the divine word. True religion is inward, of the heart, by the Spirit. It is of God, and what is of God receives praise … from God (v. 29). In Hebrew “praise ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... -B, vol. 3, pp. 186–201; and J. Jeremias, “Abraam,” TDNT, vol. 1, pp. 8–9. 4:3 See the discussion of Gen. 15:6 and the role it played in Judaism in Cranfield, Romans, vol. 1, pp. 228–30. Of faith, Hans Urs von Balthasar says, “Faith is a surrender by man to the fidelity of God in which he agrees with God from the very beginning (it is faith in God’s word) and adapts himself to that agreement” (Convergences [Ignatius Press, 1983], p. 69). 4:9–10 The midrash on Ps. 32 is Pesiq. Rab. 45 (185b ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... ,” thus connoting that free will is aided by the divine will. This age indeed works on us, but so does the Holy Spirit. It is not we who cause the gospel to have this transforming power, but the gospel itself which transforms us. The surrender of life is the believer’s responsibility, but the transformation of life is God’s. Sanctification, like justification, is equally the work of God in the believer’s life. Thus the apostle summons believers to be transformed (v. 2), to be led by the Spirit ...
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... and formulas. These are human contrivances designed to serve human ends, but the gospel is a matter of serving Christ (v. 18). The idea of serving is doubly appropriate in this context because it corresponds to the larger issue of humility and the surrendering of rights out of love. God is not made in the human image, but humanity is made in God’s image and exists to glorify him. Righteousness, peace and joy are the essential characteristics of the life transformed by Christ. The individual who ...
1022. The Rights of an Apostle
1 Corinthians 9:1-27
Understanding Series
Marion L. Soards
... properly ethical. Focusing on 1 Cor. 9:14–18, E. Käsemann (“Eine paulinische Variation des ‘amor fati,’ ” ZTK 56 [1959], pp. 138–54) critiques the understanding of Paul’s purposefulness as noblesse oblige and demonstrates that Paul’s perspective is a surrender in love of his genuine rights with a complete abandonment of expectation of reward. 9:17 One reads of the trust committed to me, which places the emphasis on the correct subject (the trust) and implies God’s activity. But one could ...
1023. Love
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
Understanding Series
Marion L. Soards
... textual problem makes it uncertain whether Paul says that without love it is no gain to hand over one’s body “in order to boast” or “in order to be burned.” Most interpreters prefer the plain sense of the notion of Paul’s hypothetically surrendering his body to the flames, although the other reading is difficult to account for if it is not original. Whichever reading is authentic, the sense of Paul’s statement is that either the pride or the selflessness of sacrifice is worthless without the ...
Understanding Series
Mary J. Evans
... loyal troops took part in ongoing skirmishes with the larger and far better equipped Philistine forces. These forces were free to send raiding parties in every direction except that in which Saul’s troops lay. The lack of an immediate surrender or a Philistine takeover speaks well for Saul’s statesmanship and military prowess. The insert explaining the dearth in Israel of blacksmiths capable of making metal tools and the exorbitant prices charged for supplying expertise is realistic. Only leaders could ...
Understanding Series
Gerald H. Wilson
... that has been systematically dismantled in the preceding verses. Having been brought through his present and continuing circumstances to confront the very worst possible explanation of his world—that God is the enemy who unjustly punishes the righteous—Job can no more surrender his trust in a God of love and mercy than can his friends. While Job’s experience forces him to make room in his worldview for the innocent suffering of the righteous, he remains grounded in the belief that the God he worships ...
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