Full Surrender Equals No Defense

I was in the middle of revitalizing a church, and I had a good friend who was the chairman of our board. We grew, exploded in this church, and we outgrew the facility. People were getting saved left and right and we were changing the constitution and bylaws, and he was helping me out so much.

And I found out out of the blue that my oldest brother had a couple days to live. My mom called me up and just said, "You're just, we'll let you know, your brother's going to die." Then all of a sudden the friend who was the chairman of our board had a freak accident, a blood clot. 24 hours later, he was about to die.

So he's in the hospital about to die. I woke up one morning, get a text from my dad out of the blue, doesn't talk to me. He just says, "Your brother's dead." About 18 hours later, my friend dies.

Leaves two teenage boys and a widow still close to us today. I went on a downhill spiral, man. When that happened, I just shut down.

And then people saw an opportunity to rise up, try and take back over a little bit. I probably didn't respond right. I was so mad all I could see was my situation in front of my face.

I started lashing out. I couldn't speak. I would cry when I would speak.

I didn't think of anybody else in their anxiety with the situation, the people I was leading. One day I was mowing the grass. I was in Indiana, where I revitalized this church, and we lived on a golf course.

I love golf, and we're on the eighth green and I was mowing, had headphones on. I was so mad. I had opportunities all over to go pastor and I'd come share it with my wife and she'd say, "I don't think God's releasing us." And why do you have to bring spirituality into this situation?

Like, Lori, there's all these cool opportunities, then there's these hateful people. Get on board with this. And she kept saying, "No, I don't think that one's it.

I think we should stay." And I was mad. I was mad at her. I was mad at God.

I was mad at the people. I had this plan finally to move far away and own a business and never talk to anybody again. I had headphones on mowing the grass.

I was listening to Shane and Shane, "I Will Wait For You." I fell to my knees and I yelled out, "Fine, I'll stay." There were three guys putting on the green. They came off the green. I look up, there's three guys with putters going, "You okay?" I'm like, "I'm fine.

Please don't call anybody." I walked in the house and I went upstairs and I was up there for a long time, and I felt one of the closest moments to God I've ever felt. And he gave me this statement out of Isaiah, when he was on trial, the Bible says that he uttered not a word. And he said to me in that moment, "Full surrender equals no defense." Full surrender equals no defense.

And that day I fully surrendered and I let him be my defender and I reentered my life into intimacy once again. And I just followed him in intimacy and let him defend my honor.