"For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved." Romans 10.10.
One of the hardest things in my life has been surrendering to God and becoming a Christian. I think that sentence sums the difficulty up nicely - the fact that we, as human beings, need to surrender in the first place shows our rebellious nature. I always thought it burdensome to follow God, even though I knew it was the right thing to do. But I think we have a very wrong understanding of God. That reminds me of a conversation I had a few weeks ago with the University chaplain. I claimed that we can never understand God fully, indeed, we even misunderstand Him because of our distorted, sinful perception of life. But the chaplain's reply was that, yes, initially we may misunderstand who God is, but through reading the Bible, we will gain a better and more complete understanding as we progress in faith.

As I have come to know different people, as I learn more about the wonderful world we live in, I am beginning to understand that my perception of God has influenced my faith so much. It wasn't so much the fact that I misunderstood Him, it was more the fact that He is too great to fit within my capability of comprehension. Even though I have made this realisation, I don't think I will ever be free from this mentality of trying to box God in, because as a human, I always want to explain things and have a particular image of who or what someone or something is made of. Perhaps that is why conflict arises so often in this world; because people behave differently to our expectations.

I am always amazed by the amount of paradoxes God uses within Christianity, or better said, within His great plan to save the world. Women, though belittled throughout history, have played a crucial part in both Jesus' birth and Jesus' resurrection. God overcame sin by becoming sin, because His love was so great He could not overlook the fact that He could not look at us for our sins.
It's this kind of understanding that led me to understand that I need to surrender. The need to surrender does not mean that there is a will to surrender. But the will to want to surrender must surely be enough!? For God, in His infinite wisdom and power can work wonders in a willing heart. And in my attempts to understand and surrender, I have been led to a spiritual place of joy that in turn has left me with a growing love for this Creator, who spent an amazing amount of effort and detail on everything He made, from the stars in the universe which hides mysteries that are yet to unfold, to the tiniest of atoms that form the secret baby inside her mother's womb.
And though nothing makes much more sense than it used to, I feel like this Creator has drawn my eyes to Him, to see the things that point towards Him and say, 'this is who He is!', and my faith, though still small, is suddenly real, because it can be no other way!

The difference between faith and belief is that of trust: to believe something merely means to accept the truth of something, but to have faith means to believe something so strongly that it results in complete trust or confidence in someone or something. True belief must then surely result in faith, a proclamation of that belief? For our faith is dead without deeds (James 2.26).
Now my surrendering is characterised by a willing, grateful heart, as I understand more of what God has done for me and who He is. Perhaps it isn't a matter of misunderstanding God, but misunderstanding faith. Faith maybe isn't meant to be felt in the heart. Logic isn't an emotion, but it can in itself provoke emotions. So then, faith maybe isn't a feeling, but rather the result of accepting something which cannot be anything else - the ultimate truth. Equally, love for God isn't necessarily a feeling either:
"In fact, this is love for God: to keep His commands. And His commands are NOT burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God."1 John 5.3-5.