Absolute Surrender # 36

   In the Chapter - How it Works, the portion of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous that is read at every AA meeting it says: "Some of us have tried to hold on to  our old ideas and the result was nil undtil we let go absolutely." and "Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the truning point. We asked for His protection and care with complete abandon."

  These phrases echo the sayings of the Keswick movement which talked of 'Letting Go and Letting God." The song "I Surrender All" also is an expression of the Keswick ideal.

   They were expressing the ideas first brougth to them by Hannah Whitall Smith who worte in "A Christains Secret of a Happy Life": 

• And as to this, it is simply letting the Lord carry and manage our affairs for us, instead of trying to do it ourselves. The greatest burden we have to carry is self.
• Do you not long to hand over management of your unmanageable self into the hands of the One who is able to manage you? Are you not tired and weary, and does not the rest I speak of look sweet to you?
• Your part is simply to rest.  His part is to sustain you, and he cannot fail.
• We mean giving up of all liberty of choice.  We mean a life of inevitable obedience.*

Today we will be talking about this act and process of letting go absolutely.

*Absolutely Sober, Page 58