Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. John 12:24-25
When it comes to our passions and desires nothing seems cut and dry. It’s like trying to navigate mirky waters - just what exactly is what? But the profound truth remains - everything starts with a desire, whether its doing good or doing evil. Given the tricky nature of desires, I suppose it’s no wonder the Bible notes, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” (Jer 17:9). Of all unruly things in existence, who has mastered the heart? Who has tamed it? For the heart is the seat of a man’s will and desires.
“The greater the potential for good, the greater the potential for evil,” Elisabeth Elliot, wife of martyr Jim Elliot, wrote in speaking on the struggle she and Jim endured as they waited to be united together in marriage. “A good and perfect gift, these natural desires. But so much more necessary that they be restrained, controlled, corrected, even crucified, that they might be reborn in power and purity for God.”
At the crux of every trial and temptation is a struggle between the self and God; we wrestle with God over who will be in charge: us or Him. We struggle between choosing His will or our own. The more valuable the prize, the greater the struggle. Deep down we want to be captain of our destinies, we want to be seated on the throne of our hearts. We are willing to obey, but only if it means we get what we want. We say, “I will surrender to the will of the Lord, but only if He gives me (fill in the blank) in return.” We want to know what’s in it for us should we choose to surrender.
Well-meaning friends and family may chime in, hoping to put a band-aid on the issue, “Of course God will give you what you want. He wants you to be happy after all.” Of course God wants us to be happy. He wouldn’t have died for us if deep down He wanted us to be miserable - hell would have taken care of that. But desires, even good ones, must be given back to God in surrender as an offering and sacrifice.
“Then [Jesus] said to them all: Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). We must surrender our will and desires to God’s will and His desires. “It’s not that everything that has to do with ourselves is in itself wicked and deserving of death,” Elisabeth Elliot explains. “It did not mean that when Jesus said, ‘Not my will [be done but Your will be done]…’ It was a choice to lay down everything.” The same choice laid before each of us.
We don’t want to surrender unconditionally, living with the uncertainty of if we will ever have that thing we really want. But having such certainty of the outcome would eliminate the heart behind sacrifice. The point of surrender would be rendered meaningless if we could know how it would all work out in the end. No trust in God would be required.
Passion comes from the word passio, which was used to refer to Christ’s suffering on the cross, hence the name of the movie The Passion of Christ. Our passions needn’t be destroyed, they need only to be submitted to God. The solution is not get rid of them altogether. All passions and desires must go through fire in order to be sanctified and purified. We must die to ourselves, surrendering to God even what’s most precious to us, just like Abraham. But don’t misunderstand me, Christ did not advocate death for the sake of dying. God is not sadistic. Christ did not die just to die, He died to be resurrected in power and glory.
Death is not an end; rather, it is the means to an end. We must die to ourselves in order to receive life in our innerbeings. Our desires and wills must die that they might be “reborn in power and purity for God.” By surrendering to God we experience life and joy. The cost is nothing compared to the reward, we give up something in order to receive something far better than we could ever dare hope or imagine. “None of us likes pain. All of us wish at times we did not need to ‘go through all this stuff.’ Let us settle it once and for all: we cannot know Christ and the power of His resurrection without the fellowship of His suffering” (Elisabeth Elliot).
