Surrender Dorothy!

January 18, 2015

By John Partridge

Scripture: 1 Samuel 3:1-20

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

In the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy Gale and her dog Toto are snatched up in tornado and
deposited in the magical land of Oz. While she is there, Dorothy is befriended by the Good Witch, Glenda, and
pursued by the Wicked Witch of the West who desperately wants Dorothys magical ruby slippers. At one
point in the movie, flying on her broom, the Wicked Witch writes a message in the sky that says, Surrender
Dorothy.

Everyone knows that the Wicked Witch is very powerful and that it might be much easier and far more
painless, to simply give her what she wants. But everyone knows that evil must be resisted. Besides, although
she doesnt completely understand why, Dorothy knows that, somehow, she needs the ruby slippers to find her
way home to Kansas.

For the witch, its all about power. She is very powerful and if she can get her hands on the ruby slippers she
will be even more powerful. It is her power that makes her demand that Dorothy surrender to her. She is a
bully who is accustomed to using her power, or the threat of it, to get what she wants. The wicked witch is evil
and not to be trusted and for that reason, no one really wants to surrender to her.

But compare the wicked witch to those who fight for good. During Desert Storm, U.S. forces often
encountered Iraqi military units who desired to surrender to them. In one notable event, an Iraqi unit waved a
white flag of surrender at a Navy drone that was being used to spot for offshore naval bombardment. It took
several hours for infantry units to arrive and accept their surrender.

Why were these men so willing to surrender? Because US forces had a reputation for doing good and not evil.
The men who surrendered had little food, almost no water, and virtually no support of any kind from their own
military but after surrendering they were well fed, given good medical care, and any other needs were provided
for. In their case, surrender was the best thing that they could do.

Let us keep these stories in mind this morning as we read three stories from scripture that relate to this idea of
surrender. We begin in 1 Samuel 3:1-20, where we read the story of how the young Samuel encounters God
for the first time.
The boy Samuel ministered before the LORD under Eli. In those days the word of the LORD was rare; there were
not many visions.
2

One night Eli, whose eyes were becoming so weak that he could barely see, was lying down in his usual
place. 3 The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the house of the LORD, where the
ark of God was. 4 Then the LORD called Samuel.
Samuel answered, Here I am. 5 And he ran to Eli and said, Here I am; you called me.
But Eli said, I did not call; go back and lie down. So he went and lay down.
6

Again the LORD called, Samuel! And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, Here I am; you called me.

My son, Eli said, I did not call; go back and lie down.
7

Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD: The word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.

A third time the LORD called, Samuel! And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, Here I am; you called
me.
Then Eli realized that the LORD was calling the boy. 9 So Eli told Samuel, Go and lie down, and if he calls
you, say, Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening. So Samuel went and lay down in his place.
10

The LORD came and stood there, calling as at the other times, Samuel! Samuel!

Then Samuel said, Speak, for your servant is listening.

11

And the LORD said to Samuel: See, I am about to do something in Israel that will make the ears of everyone
who hears about it tingle. 12 At that time I will carry out against Eli everything I spoke against his familyfrom
beginning to end. 13 For I told him that I would judge his family forever because of the sin he knew about; his
sons blasphemed God, and he failed to restrain them. 14 Therefore I swore to the house of Eli, The guilt of Elis
house will never be atoned for by sacrifice or offering.
15

Samuel lay down until morning and then opened the doors of the house of the LORD. He was afraid to tell Eli
the vision, 16 but Eli called him and said, Samuel, my son.
Samuel answered, Here I am.
17

What was it he said to you? Eli asked. Do not hide it from me. May God deal with you, be it ever so
severely, if you hide from me anything he told you. 18 So Samuel told him everything, hiding nothing from him.
Then Eli said, He is the LORD; let him do what is good in his eyes.
19

The LORD was with Samuel as he grew up, and he let none of Samuels words fall to the ground. 20 And all
Israel from Dan to Beersheba recognized that Samuel was attested as a prophet of the LORD. 21 The LORD
continued to appear at Shiloh, and there he revealed himself to Samuel through his word.
2

Eli the priest was getting old when the young man, Samuel, was called by God. Although Samuel had grown
up in the Temple, he did not know the Lord. This is clearly a condemnation of Eli and introduces the idea that
all is not well under his leadership. Before long we see that Eli has not been doing his job, has not been raising
his own children to follow God, and has not corrected them when they did wrong. But even though Samuel is
afraid to tell Eli the bad news, Eli takes it well and accepts Gods judgment.
Even though Eli had done wrong, he was surrendered to God.
And as Samuel grows into adulthood, he too surrenders to God, but Samuel not only accepts Gods judgment,
he lives his life in surrender to God.
Elis surrender is more like Dorothy and the wicked witch. Eli knows that he cannot win, and so accepts the
inevitable. Samuels surrender is joyful. Samuel knows that doing Gods will every day is a benefit to him as
well as to the purposes of God. Because of Samuels surrender and obedience, everyone notices that God is at
work in the world and that God speaks through Samuel.
This idea of surrender is a big deal.
Dorothy could not surrender to the wicked witch because she didnt trust that the witch had her best interests in
mind. But Samuel surrendered to God because he trusted God and knew that God loved him.
Eli surrendered to Gods judgment, but failed to surrender his life to God. Eli did not live the way that God
had commanded and did not teach his children to do the will of God. For that reason, he was judged by God.
The idea of surrender is a big deal to us too.
Surrendering to God means that we trust God enough to live the way that God commands.
And that brings us to 1 Corinthians 6:12-20, where we hear Paul quoting the church from two thousand years
ago, and it sounds like he is quoting people that we hear in our generation every day.
12

I have the right to do anything, you saybut not everything is beneficial. I have the right to do
anythingbut I will not be mastered by anything. 13 You say, Food for the stomach and the stomach for food,
and God will destroy them both. The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and
the Lord for the body. 14 By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. 15 Do you
not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite
them with a prostitute? Never! 16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her
in body? For it is said, The two will become one flesh. 17 But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him
in spirit.
18

Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually,
sins against their own body. 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you,
whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God
with your bodies.
How often do we hear people in our generation say things like I have the right to do anything? If we dont
hear those words exactly, we hear words that sound a lot like them. Today, we hear a great many people say
that they have a right to do a great many things. We have freedom. We are free to do a great many things.
But not everything is beneficial.
Not everything that we do is good.
Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach was built for food, but in the end, everything that the stomach
and food can do is temporary and is of no lasting value. From the sound of it, Food for the stomach and the
stomach for food was a common argument in favor of rationalizing the pursuit of pleasure through food. But
Paul argues that if we are going to spend time and effort on something, there are more important things to
worry about than caviar, wine and fine food. We have things of eternal importance that require our time,
attention and effort. And then, as popular as the Food Network is today, Paul takes aim at one of our cultures
most popular indulgences, sex.

Our culture often cries out that I can do anything. We often hear others rationalize their actions by saying,
As long as it is two consenting adults and no one gets hurt then I can do anything. But Paul again argues that
we have bigger and more important fish to fry. Just as food has no lasting value, sexual immorality is not what
we ought to be spending our time on. God designed the human body so that it could experience pleasure, but
did not design it for the purpose of immorality. God designed us to be dedicated to him, as he is dedicated to
us.
Paul points out that because we are the Body of Christ, and Christ lives within us, if we unite with a prostitute
or otherwise engage in sexual immorality, then we invite Christ to come with us. For most of us, that is
unthinkable, and yet Jesus goes with us everywhere we go. If we engage in sexual relations with another, we
become one flesh with that person whether we are married to them or not. God desires for us to become
one flesh with our spouse but more importantly, desires for us to become one in Spirit with God.

It doesnt matter whether we are pursuing pleasure through food, or sex, or alcohol, or drugs, or opulence, or
anything else. Our goal is not to insist on exercising our rights. Our goal is not to experience as much pleasure
as possible, but to treat our bodies as the temple of God because we are the Body of Christ and because our
bodies are the home of the Spirit of God.

Our goal is to honor God.

Thats why surrender is a big deal.

Eli surrendered to Gods judgment, but failed to surrender his life to God. Eli did not live the way that God
had commanded and did not teach his children to do the will of God. For that reason, he was judged by God.

When God asks for our surrender it isnt like the Wicked Witch, but instead as one who loves us, cares for us,
and who wants what is best for us.
Surrender means honoring God with our bodies
Surrender means honoring God in all things.
Surrendering to God means that we trust God enough to live the way that God commands.
Will you surrender or will you insist on your right to do as you please?

 You have been reading a message presented at Trinity United Methodist Church on the date noted at the top of the first
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