'Submission' is a powerful concept

Last Sunday in our little Spanish-language branch, a sister spoke well and forcefully about obedience.It was the kind of talk that keeps you thinking after the closing prayer.And it got me thinking about the difference between "obedience" and "submission."We don't use the word "submission" often in the church. My guess is that's because the word has an aura of unwillingness about it. You know, "He beat me into submission" — that sort of thing.But when used properly, I think "submission" may be the most powerful concept in the gospel.People can obey for all kinds of reasons. They obey out of love or respect. But they can also obey out of fear or to gain an advantage.Some obey for the sake of image. Some obey out of habit.But "willing submission" is all internal, not external. It means turning over the keys of your life to another driver, to allow someone else to decide.And that can be frightening.When we obey, we obey laws and rules.But when we submit, we are saying, "Not my will, but thine." We must submit ourselves to another being. And that can feel a lot like slavery, or prison.But in the right frame of mind, it feels like complete freedom.That is the Christian paradox.Paul begins his Epistle to Philemon by showcasing that notion. He calls himself, "Paul, a prisoner of Jesus Christ."Paul had turned over his personal freedom in order to find a greater freedom.He was a master of submissive behavior.Me?Not so much.I'm better at obeying than submitting. Turning my will over to somebody else never comes easy for me."God will never put me in charge of the church," my mother used to say, "because I'd fill every chapel with candles."God will never put me in charge of the church for a hundred such reasons.Still, down inside, I know that submission can lead to all that's good.Obedience might keep you on the straight and narrow, but submission opens the gate at the end of it.For such reasons, there's one scripture that always hits me between the eyes. It's Mosiah 3:19 — the one that talks about the natural man being an enemy to God, then tells us to become "as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father."I balk at that.I'm afraid if I give up my will, if I submit to someone else, my personality will melt away.I'll lose myself.But then, in Christianity, that's really the point of it all, isn't it?