Genesis 35:1-5 – Then God said to Jacob, “Go up at once to Bethel and live there.   Make an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.”  ² So Jacob told his household and all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods you have among you.  Purify yourselves and change your clothes.  ³ Let us go up at once to Bethel.  Then I will make an altar there to God, who responded to me in my time of distress and has been with me wherever I went.”

⁴ So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods that were in their possession and the rings that were in their ears.  Jacob buried them under the oak near Shechem ^5, and they started on their journey.  The surrounding cities were afraid of God, and they did not pursue the sons of Jacob.”

During the winter, I was reading, praying, and meditating on the word.   Snow covered the ground, and the trees were flocked, glistening white under the lights.  The air was damp and cold, making staying inside inviting.   But, in my heart, there was a warm glow powered by love.  Love from and to God and love from and for people!

As I prayed, read, and considered the Word of God today, the thought of completeness captured my thoughts.   Complete obedience, complete surrender, and complete transformation all tugged at my heart and mind.

Long before Jacob was born, God had forbidden the worship of any other being.   His directive regarding idols was to destroy them.  That makes Jacob’s action in Genesis 35:4 intriguing and perplexing.   His family gave him their foreign gods (idols) and earrings (associated with those gods).  “AND Jacob hid them under the oak which was near Shechem.”

He hid them, rather than destroying them.   I suggest that hiding them left a doorway for them to be retrieved.   That failed the completeness test.   The question is, “Was that the doorway through which some of the troubles Israel faced came?”   Completeness in obedience and surrender is the only sure way to victory and our best defense.   If God has our whole heart, He also has our actions.

In the Book of Acts, we see completeness in obedience and surrender in the apostle Paul. In Acts 20:26, Paul makes a powerful declaration that is filled with comfort, hope, and revelation.

We know Paul’s history as Saul of Tarsus before the Damascus road experience.   He had caused believers to be imprisoned, punished, and murdered.  But in Acts 20:26, he says, “I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all.”

What?   But, Paul, what about your history?   You helped shed innocent blood.  How can you say you are innocent?  How?  By Grace, through repentance!   Paul’s completeness in surrender and obedience gave him a New History!

That is what we have in Salvation.  We have a brand-new history with no past!  Our lives truly began and can only be traced to the day of our conversion.

We remember the past; God does not!   He has cast our sins into the sea of no more remembrance and put them behind Him, as far as the East is from the West.   They are never remembered again!   It is an insult to God’s grace to bring them back up and rehearse them in our minds.

Salvation is complete forgiveness!   It is a complete transformation!  It is newness of life, DNA, and a second chance!   Therefore, it is important that we leave no room or place to go back.   Don’t hide the idols of the past.  Surrender them to God and be made complete!  

We are New Creations in Christ with no past before the day the Blood of Jesus washed away our sins!   We are New!  We are Complete!   We are those who live in His fullness!  We have His promise of victory, so let’s seize the promise and live in His fullness.

LORD, help our surrender to be complete and our obedience to be total.