When is the last time you sang the beautiful hymn I surrender all?

…I surrender all — I surrender all — all to thee my blessed savior, I surrender all!…

Did you wholeheartedly mean it? Did you pause to ask yourself, ‘What am I willing to surrender for Jesus?
And equally important, what am I not willing to surrender?’

John Leonard Dober and David Nitschman answered these questions with their lives. They were not martyred but choose instead to sell themselves into slavery for the remainder of their lives. Leaving their comfortable homes, their families and their freedom, the two departed Copenhagen in 1732 for good.

These two men spent the remainder of their lives as slaves in the West Idies where they became missionaries amongst their fellow slaves. Why they did so was proclaimed in their final words to their sobbing families as the ship departed: “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering!”

This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John 15:12,13

These men sacrificed their very lives in service to their King. I must ask myself, would I be willing to do the same? Would you?