For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life.” (2 Corinthians 5:4). It is a scary thing to surrender our will to God. Our agency is the only thing that is uniquely ours and we will fight tooth and nail to hold onto it. When the Lord asks us to submit to His will, it can feel like we are just a tiny speck in a vast ocean of unknowable depths and the Lord is asking us to stop struggling and be swallowed up by His will. How can we possibly do that? Why would the Lord ask us to agree to being drowned, essentially? The thing is, we are swimming in living waters. If we will just stop resisting and trust in God's will, we will find that even though we are swallowed up, we are swallowed up in life. We will find that even as we are completely submerged we can nevertheless breathe better than we ever could before. The real struggle is when we are thrashing around on the surface. Once we stop panicking and start trusting, we will find that what we are swallowed up in is the grace and the wisdom and the tender mercies of our Heavenly Father. When we are drowning in Living Waters, our misery is swallowed up in joy, our fears are swallowed up in peace, our mortality is swallowed up in life. We can cling to our sense of autonomy and kick against the gentle pull of our Heavenly Father's love, but we will wear ourselves out by trying so hard to separate ourselves from God. It is far better for us to let go of who or what we think we are supposed to be and instead allow ourselves to be surrounded by and swallowed up and drowning in the living waters of our Father's love.
