We, as the human race, are very territorial. We lay claim to things, places, and people. We can see this in the deeds we sign our names to, the fences we wrap our homes in, and the protectiveness we feel for our families.
There are times we have to turn loose. Grammy’s old quilt that reflects her carefree personality in its flamboyant patterns? Of course, Honey, you can have that. The lake home we’ve owned since the kids were small? It’s so much better as a college fund for the grandbabies. Our daughter’s boyfriend, not the young man we’d choose? We can open our hand and set her free.
This is all submission. We submit to another’s desire for the beauty woven into that quilt. We allow our memories to become submerged beneath our grandchildren’s needs. We let our daughter’s happiness subjugate our own.
We submit to allowing others’ needs to rise above what we treasure most of all.
How can we submit to the Lord? It’s as easy as letting the donkey out of the gate. Of course, we have to leave the gate ajar. Otherwise, how will he find his way out?
Exodus 20:17 gives us step #1:
“You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.”
Again, we are territorial as a species. That’s what makes us covet. We cannot truly experience something until we own it (or so we sometimes think). We must open the gates and set things free.
Zechariah 9:9 shows us what we will receive:
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”
For the few Jews who were able to release the vast religious encumbrances that were holding them hostage, the donkey was already out of the gate; and on its back rode Jesus, the greatest King of all time.
Job 39:5 asks the question that changes all humanity:
“Who has let the wild donkey go free? Who has loosed the bonds of the swift donkey?”
This passage in Job isn’t precisely about the coming Christ, but the lament is apropos. Who indeed has set the donkey free? Who indeed has opened the gates of submission, that all may accept the Christ and worship him in spirit and in truth?
Only by turning loose of the possessions we hold so dearly can we find the Christ that gives us life. It’s time to open our hands and set the things of this world free so that we might grasp the hand of Jesus and learn to trust in him.
What we hold to defines us. Are we like the world, or are we becoming like Jesus?
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