Of all the things that life is/can be, in a very pure and simplistic form, life is a series of surrenders: to things, to ideas, to people. To that end, success in life is microscopically measured by one's level of surrender - not just that you yielded, but how you yielded. Did you yield, initially, but later decide to rebuff based on what the next surrender was asking of you? Did you throw your hands up to the wrong person, the wrong substance, the wrong purpose?? Did you yield all the way to victory?? Still, letting go and growing??? These are questions we should ask of ourselves when gauging growth vs. stagnation in our lives.
In a dynamic similar fashion, life in CHRIST JESUS begs to be measured and graded on the same scale: how's my surrender game? Does GOD have all of me, some of me, or none of me?? Have I stopped living Saved after getting Saved??? Can GOD, like HE did with Abraham, ask me to give up the thing I hold dearest??? Can GOD show me what's in my heart and I do something about it??? I know, right!!!???
Listen, our "yes" to JESUS should be continual, ranging wider and deeper with each day, each week, each blessing, each fulfilled promise, each deliverance, each promotion, each disappointment, each breakthrough. Every single thing that GOD does, from the breaths that we take to the activity of our limbs, none of which we deserve, is entitled to a response and should knock at our hearts to render a greater level of access, whether that access was initially denied or was allowed, but we were introduced to another level we didn't realize we could or had to give.
The "yes", today, is by no means popular, if for no other reason than the price tag affixed. "Yes" is expensive: it will cost you people, hopes, dreams, timing, wants, desires, places, etc. Now, none of these things we just mentioned did we do so within the context of the Will of GOD. Herein lies the beauty in surrender and the artistry of the "yes": sacrifice is not a sacrifice unless it costs you something that to you holds value; so we learn to trade this shade of contentment for the pure color of peace, this note of acclaim for the auto-tuning of accountability, being broken by the same brush that paints us a masterpiece. How is this beautiful or artistic, you ask? Desirable, even?? After the ugliness or construction, destruction, reconstruction, the result is something people admire, something people can refer to, rest in, reside in. But what's often required before any work can be started? A permit.
Does GOD have your "yes"? HE should; HE deserves it.
GOD blesses what HE builds. GOD bless you.