Book Notes

Discipline: The Glad Surrender - by Elizabeth Elliot

"Strive to choose, not that which is easiest, but that which is most difficult. Do not deprive your soul of the agility which it needs to mount up to Him." --Saint John Of The Cross

Chapter One: Created, Cared for, Called - condensed into notes

Everything created is connected, for everything is produced by the same mind, the same love, and is dependent on the same Creator. He who masterminded the universe, the Lord God Omnipotent, is the One who called the stars into being, commanded light, spoke the Word that brought about the existence of time and space and every form of matter: salt and stone, rose and redwoods, feather and fur and fin and flesh. Not only the animals, but we too are created, owned, possessed, known. 

We are just as dependent as the wild animal. We say "free as a bird," but the truth is God meant us to be freer than birds. He made us in His own image, which menas He gave us things He did not give them: reason and will and the power to choose. God calls me. In a deeper sense than any other species of earthbound creature, I am called. And in a deeper sense I am free inwardly. I am free to be totally and completely free without bounds within Christ. My fulfillment as a human is dependent on Christ, for it is a loving Lord who calls me through the world's fog to His island of peace. If I trust Him, I will obey Him gladly.