True nobility of both the inner and the outer life comes from submission to, and cooperation with, God. The nature of our relations with God depends upon the extent of our submission to him. This is well illustrated in the relation of husband and wife. When two marry, and there’s no merging of the wills and purposes, but each retains his or her individuality, standing apart from the other in wish and desire, in choosing and willing, their union can never be a happy one. They must yield themselves to each other. There must be a merging of their wills into each other, a combining of their purposes, a consideration of each other, a sacrificing of the individual will. The husband and wife who really love each other can enjoy each other’s society and draw near to each other in spirit and affection. This makes their union a blessed reality, and a source of more true joy than any other natural relation. Those who thus enjoy each other are the ones who have sacrificed self and lost sight of selfish considerations; each desires to please the other and each finds his or her happiness in the happiness of the other.

In the Scriptures, Christ is represented as being the husband of the church, and the church is taught to submit to him as a wife should submit to her husband. The wife submits to her husband because she loves him---if she submits from any other reason she must be unhappy in her submission. The submission, that comes from love, and is the willing response of love, is the source of the deepest and truest happiness that can come from human sources. So the submission to God, which is acceptable to him, and which reacts in blessedness to the soul who submits, must be based upon love. The secret of such submission is thus stated by John, “We have known and believed the love that God hath to us.” (1 John 4:16) So he exclaims in the next breath, “God is love.” Only the truly submitted heart can fathom the love of God, or can love God with that self-enriching love, which inspires devotion and causes us to delight in God. The fervor of love softens the will and makes it flexible. When we love, it is easy to obey; it is easy to submit. All the irksomeness and compulsion is taken out of religion when the heart is full of love toward God. The more we love, the easier it is to serve, and the more joyful is that service. Self-surrender is the heart of all true religion. Paul told the secret when he said of a certain church, that they “first gave their own selves.” Then they could endure persecutions. They could bear with patience the things, which came upon them, and still be full of joy. The yoke of God was not galling to them. The sufferings that came upon them were not hard to be borne. They were overrunning with love. Their hearts were knit together with bonds stronger than death. They could be exceedingly joyful in all their tribulations, because they had first given themselves. Oh, the barrenness and unhappiness, in the lives of many persons, because they are trying to give service, when they haven’t given themselves! They are trying to serve God, but at the same time they’re serving themselves. They try to combine these two services, and what an unsatisfying, irksome service they find it! How often their will is contrary to God’s will! How often their will breaks out to claim its own way! This conflict of wills shuts out from their lives the blessed sense of God’s nearness and approval, which is granted to those who have first given themselves; who have yielded their all without reservation to God; who have surrendered themselves, and their wills, and now find a continuous inspiration to service in the delight of their own hearts in serving. A religion, which is not based on self-surrender is a mere form. It is of no more value than the religion of the pagan, for it is the same kind of a religion that he has. True religion is love---love flowing out in devotion, and service, and self-surrender. The forms of religion are nothing without the real inner substance. If we have the form, without the inner content, we are poor indeed; but if we are thoroughly submitted to God, we have the inner content of religion, no matter in what form it manifests itself.
[ End of Part 2 of 5 ]