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Although Jesus is supposed to be both our Savior and Lord, many of us rarely allow Him to fulfill the latter role in our lives. Instead, we often live as if God is just a travelling buddy or safety net, rejecting His Lordship and expecting Him to help us when we exhaust our energy or fall into trouble. Unfortunately, this mindset robs us of the abundant life God desires to lead and empower us to live. As John 21:1-6 reveal, we cannot live this blessed life and receive God's best for us unless we allow Christ to reign over us through three key areas of our lives.
The first area we must fully surrender to Him is our will. Proverbs 3:5-6 reveal that for Christ to be Lord over us, we must pivot from relying on our own understanding to fully trusting the Father's will for our life direction. While following our own will can bring worldly success and prosperity, Proverbs 14:12 and 16:25 warn that self-directed living will eventually reap destruction, especially to our relationship with Christ. Furthermore, as the disciples experienced when choosing to return to their pre-Christ lives in John 21:2-3, our self-direction can waste significant time and energy on fruitless pursuits. Conversely, as obedience to Jesus resulted in the disciples' net overflowing with fish in verses 5-6, so does surrendering to God's will allow Him to richly bless us spiritually and in other areas of our lives. Thus, making Christ Lord over our will allows us to travel the path of life in Psalm 16:11, where we receive His loving presence, overflowing joy, and abundant blessings.
Next, after learning to surrender our will, then we must do the same for the daily decisions we make. It is not enough to simply follow God's calling and long-term will for us, for His Lordship demands control over even the most minor choices we face. Otherwise, we fall into the dangerous trap Proverbs 3:5-6 warn of and foolishly lean on our own limited understanding. Again, the disciples saw this in John 21:2-3, where a simple self-made decision to spend many hours fishing profited them nothing. While verses 4-6 show Jesus graciously turning their poor decision for good, James 1:5 notes God's desire for us to ask Him first for His perfect wisdom in every situation and decision we face. Thus, to receive His best, Christ must not only be Lord over our life's general direction, but also our every decision.
Furthermore, Christ must reign over our response to obeying Him. While we may seek God's will for our life path and moment-by-moment decisions, our response can still yield fruitlessness if done in our own limited strength. Romans 8:8 warns that when we obey and serve according to our own resources, we do so from the flesh and reap nothing that can please or be blessed by God. As the disciples saw in John 21:2-3, God did not bless their self-driven efforts. Conversely, when they obeyed Jesus in verse 6, they received an abundance of fish solely through His power and provision. Thus, because Christ has given us His perfect power as Philippians 4:13 and Ephesians 3:20 note, we should surrender our own efforts and allow Him to completely reign over how we serve and obey Him.
Although we make Him our Savior, Christ cannot fully rule as our Lord unless we hand Him the keys to our lives. If we refuse to do this, we will lose out on God's best for us and, like the disciples in John 21:2-3, chase fruitless pursuits that waste our time and energy. Conversely, the fullness of Christ's abundant life is ours when we willingly yield our will, decisions, and service to His perfect rulership. Through this surrender, we can walk His perfect path of life, make godly decisions, and receive His power to serve Him mightily for His glory.
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