"If there is any remnant of individual conceit left, it always says "I can’t." Personality never says "I can’t," but simply absorbs and absorbs. Personality always wants more and more. It is the way we are built. We are designed with a great capacity for God; and sin and our individuality are the things that keep us from getting at God. God delivers us from sin: we have to deliver our selves from individuality, i.e., to present our natural life to God and sacrifice it until it is transformed into a spiritual life by obedience."
We surrender ourselves when we give up trying to accomplish or acquire anything ourselves, and instead expect and receive from God:
"He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?" (Romans 8:32)
"Freely give." If you still think that it's still in your capacity to get on your own, if you see God's grand generosity as merely optional, consider the following:
"And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
"And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so." (Genesis 1: 29-30)
When God created the heaven and the earth, he then gave EVERYTHING to the man and the woman whom He fashioned in His image. They did not work for anything, they did nto strive for anything, they did not merit anything. This was the original status that God wanted to confer on us.
"John [the Baptist] answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven." (John 3:27)
We cannot receive unless it comes from heaven, from God the father.
"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." (James 1:17)
You need something? God the Father of Lights has what you need, and He is ready to give it. It must be received, for that is the only way to get it.
Contrary to Chamber's assertion, we are created with more than a mere "great capacity" for God. The Preacher put it best:
"He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end." (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
We have eternity set within us, and only eternity can meet that need.
God gives liberally:
"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." (James 1:5)
And His giving in itself gives all the more:
"And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:" (2 Corinthians 9:8)
Let there be not a trace of self-sufficiency left in every believer who trusts in the Lord Jesus Christ, for:
"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
"Not of works, lest any man should boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)
God's grace, unmerited favor, saves us, and by faith we receive this grace, a faith which we receive, not conceive on our own.
God is all giving; all we can do is receive!
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