Submit yourselves, then, to God. James 4:7 (NIV).

The battle for your life involves submitting yourself to Christ every day. Some Christians are defeated before they even get out of bed! That’s because for weeks, maybe months, they’ve not submitted themselves to Christ. Are you dry, lukewarm or backslidden? If you are, it may be because you stopped submitting yourself to Christ.

If you want fullness of life, if you want freedom, if you really want the extravagant and abundant life Christ wants to give you, then you’ve got to place your life under his lordship. There are actually three things you need to do in order to submit yourself to Christ:

First, consecrate yourself totally to Him. You must give Him your body (cf. Romans 12:1), soul (cf. Luke 10:27), and spirit (cf. 1 Corinthians 6:17). You can’t hold anything back. Give Him everything. Renew your relationship with Him. Surrender all. Give Him your heart and mind and strength.

Second, cover yourself with the blood. The blood of Christ is a very powerful weapon in the battle for your life. If you want life, you’ve got to cover yourself with the blood of Christ. Christ’s blood is efficacious. There’s life in the blood (cf. Leviticus 17:11). He “… has freed us from our sins by shedding his blood for us” Revelation 1:5 (NLT).

Are you living under condemnation? You’ve bought into the lies of the devil. The enemy has told you that you’re weak, ugly, stupid, impotent, useless or pathetic. And now you’re living under a cloud. You’ve accepted the abnormal as normal. Well it’s time to say, “No more! I’m washed in the blood of the Lamb! Christ has shed His blood to set me free!” Choose life. Cover yourself with the blood. For the blood disarms the devil (cf. Revelation 12:11).

Third, confess your sin. You may be spiritually impotent because you’re harbouring un-confessed sin. 1 John 1:9 reminds us that “… if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong” (NLT). You can’t have fullness of life until you’ve been cleansed from every wrong. So choose life. Confess all sins of commission and omission. And in particular, confess any sin or agreement you wittingly or unwittingly made with the devil. Renounce any and all gods or idols in your life. Ask God to search you and reveal any aspect of your life that is not pleasing to Him.

Do you want fullness of life? Submit to Christ by consecrating yourself to Him, by covering yourself with His blood, and by confessing your sin.