And work for the peace and prosperity of Babylon. Pray to the LORD for that city where you are held captive, for if Babylon has peace, so will you. --Jeremiah 29:7
The Israelites had almost everything taken from them by the Babylonians. Their riches were stolen along with their freedom, their temple was burned to the ground, the lives of their friends and family were ended before their eyes. And in the midst of the grief and heartache over all that was lost when they were exiled from their homeland, God tells them to pray for Babylon. Their story certainly makes anything my enemies have done to me seem like acts of kindness, and it humbles me to think that I struggle to forgive my small enemies when God asked the Israelites to forgive the very people who ransacked the entire nation, who killed their children and did all they could to rob those who lived of any fragment of hope. But that is exactly who God is and what God expects from us.
When our enemies try to break us, God offers us wholeness and hope as a reward for our faithfulness to Him. He told the Israelites to get over themselves and pray for peace instead of vengeance for their enemies because peace for their enemies meant peace for them. How true this is in our own lives. When I was in a recovery group for my eating issues, I remember hearing the mantra "Hurt people hurt people" over and over again. Oftentimes those who we view as our enemies are hurting us because they themselves are hurt. Just like we love others out of the overflow of love in our hearts, we hurt others when our hearts are overflowing with pain. If we pray for healing for the pain and chaos in the lives of our enemies, then the peace they have will bring peace to us. God is so logical!
The problem for us is that it's easier for us to see the logic of praying for one's enemies when we aren't the ones suffering. When we're the ones in the midst of pain and chaos caused by our enemies, our hearts don't feel much like praying for the cause of our pain even if God says we should and even if we can understand the logic of why. But God rarely calls us to do what is easiest. It's when we do what He asks even when it's hard that we grow the most and that we see the desired results in our lives. He asks us to love our enemies because it is what is best for us and what brings Him the most glory, not because it's the most comfortable. And when we do what He askes, He is faithful to His promise to restore our lives to peace.
But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. --Luke 6:27-28
As a Christian, one of the hardest principles for me to practice has been to pray for and love my enemies. The few people that I would actually see as "enemies" have hurt me so deeply that just letting go of the hurt takes lots of effort and lots of prayer. And then when I think I've done it, someone will mention that person to me and all the hurt they caused me will come back and I'll have to start from scratch. Forgiveness is a complicated matter.
So this morning I was talking to God yet again about a person I seem to have to forgive over and over again. I told Him how hard it is for me to pray for good things for this person after all that went down between us. While I was praying, God showed me something I should have probably realized awhile ago in relation to this particular person. I don't need to be praying for worldly blessings and a comfortable life for this person, I need to be praying for salvation and for that person's walk with God. That's the only blessing that really matters. It is not God's will for anyone to be lost.
Sin is the cause of most of the pain in the world. It's the cause of the pain that my enemies have put in my life and the cause of the pain that I have put in the lives of others. But that pain doesn't matter compared to the souls that are at stake. Grudges are the enemy's will, forgiveness and freedom are God's will. I need to put all pettiness aside and pray for the lost--including the lost that have wounded me--because even the deepest of my hurts is pettiness in the face of eternity.
As promised, I am posting what I wrote for my student's scrapbook. This started out as a letter, but as I was writing, it turned into a prayer, so I went back and changed the whole piece to a prayer for my student's future. For this posting, I removed my student's name from the prayer (as indicated by the ---), but otherwise, for better or worse, here are the words that my student will carry with her as part of her scrapbook:
Father God, I lift up --- as she steps into another chapter of her life and her walk with you. I pray that you would give her the courage to passionately pursue the dreams that you have planted in her heart and that she would never find satisfaction in anything less than your best for her. I pray that you would give her the strength to stand firm in the face of the enemy’s challenges, using the shield of faith to protect her from his arrows and the sword of the spirit to hold him at bay. Father, I pray that you would deepen her trust in you, and that she would never waiver in her belief that you know what you’re doing even if she doesn’t see your entire plan.
Lord God, I pray for --- to follow the example of Jesus by loving big and loving much. I do not ask you to protect her from pain and heartbreak, but instead I pray that when she feels let down by the world that you would walk with her through her tears, purifying and restoring her heart so that she would grow from her pain and not be broken by it. In the same vein, Lord, I pray that you would teach --- to forgive truly and completely as you forgive us. Teach her to walk in your grace, free from all anger, bitterness, and pride that the enemy would use to hinder her heart in reflecting your love to the world. Lord Jesus, I pray that --- would always surround herself with people who love you and who will redirect her gaze upward when her eyes shift to the circumstances around her. I pray these Christian friends would never tire of reminding her to focus on you as the rock in this life of constant change. Father, I pray that --- would never forget who she is and who you have called her to be.
Finally, Lord, I pray that --- would wake up each morning with joy and excitement at what you have in store for her. Life is many things, but most of all it is an adventure. I pray that --- would face all of the adventures that you have planned for her with generous hands, an open heart, and wide eyes that are fixed on you, eagerly waiting to see what you will do next. Lord Jesus, I pray that --- would make you the song of her heart. I pray, that you would remove all fear from her and that she would give the gift of herself to the world without reservation, knowing that what we see as failure, you see as opportunity. Father, I entrust --- to your care as she blossoms into the woman you have created her to be. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to know her, however briefly, and to witness a small part of her journey. I also thank you for all of the lives that I know --- will touch in the years to come. I pray all these things in the name of Jesus. Amen.
A tragedy like what happened yesterday on the campus of Virginia Tech University inevitably calls people to question where God is in the midst of senseless pain and suffering. It's small comfort to many to know that God is grieving with us. People want to know why He didn't stop the tragedy from occuring. The answer is not that God doesn't care. He cares about each of us very deeply and intimately and His heart is more grieved that we can know. What happened yesterday happened because of sin which entered the world because God chose to give us free will. Sometimes people use their free to will to sin and hurt other people, whether on a smaller scale such as theft, adultery, rape or individual murder or on a larger scale such as the mass murder that happened yesterday. The innocent are hurt because of the actions of the guilty. This is the nature of life. God did not create robots. He gave us free will because He wanted us to have a genuine love relationship with Him, but with free will comes the option to reject God, and, in cases like what happened yesterday or what has been happening around the world with genocide and wars, that rejection of God leads to heartache for many. Much of the pain in our world is caused by somebody's sin. We complain when we are hurt by the sin of others because it doesn't seem fair, but do not think that we are alone in our tears. God is hurt by our pain and by the sin that claims the lives of the innocent and the innocence of the alive. This is not how He wanted the world to be and it's not how it would be if we chose Him.
Events like this always bring me back to the importance of living in today. Tomorrow is not a guarantee for any of us, and that fact is so easy to forget when we move comfortably through our routine lives. I know that God has used the most heart breaking events in my life to bring me back to Him and take me away from the false security of my self-focused existence. On a large scale, He uses these experiences to bring us together as a people to pour out love and prayers over each other whereas during most of our days we are negligent and lazy in truly and actively loving one another. I am not a wise theologian, and I certainly don't pretend to know the mind of God. I do know from personal experience that the only way to get through tragedy is to focus on the good, because if you only look at the bad, you will lose heart and the enemy will have victory. We serve a God who is capable of bringing good out of everything (Romans 8:28), even the effects of our sin. He is working in this Virginia Tech tragedy already, and we just need to keep praying and watching Him move. In many ways, this is a helpless feeling for human beings who want to be able to fix everything. I watched the news last night and heard all the finger pointing that the media was attempting to do, and I turned to John and asked him what they were trying to accomplish by casting blame. We want things to make sense and we want to sleep peacefully at night knowing that someone was to blame when something goes wrong. Life isn't that simple. Situations like this show an even larger societal failure that goes beyond university leadership and that would probably be too complex to address in a 30 minute news segment--a societal failure that cannot be fixed without reexamining our values, our lifestyle, and our relationship with our Creator, whether we acknowledge Him or not. The media does not want to tackle this so they cast individual blame, but I challenge the followers of Christ to check to see how much of your life aligns with God's word versus how much aligns with society's noise. Ask yourself what you can do to help further the cause of God today rather than the world's cause. And make sure that you are not sleep-walking through your daily routine when you should be living every day like your last because you never know when your last day will be. Sorry to be morbid, but it's true, and if no other good comes from this situation for you, I pray that you would gain an awareness of the preciousness of every breath that you take and that you would treasure the miracle of being alive even in times of pain.
Last night at dinner, my friends and I somehow got on the subject of a person from my past who wronged me. As soon as the topic came up, my mood went from happy-go-lucky to fuming mad. It has been several years and so much has changed in my life since then, but somewhere in my heart I have been harboring bitterness and it came to the surface in a very ugly way last night at simply the mention of a name. I know that the Christian thing to do is forgive and forget. I serve a God who has removed my sins from me as far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12). I have no right to fill my heart with unforgiveness when I have been forgiven so much.
Nevertheless, knowing this in my head and transferring it to my heart is a more difficult task than it may seem like on paper (or on the computer screen as the case may be). Even with the understanding that I am called to forgive just as I have been forgiven, I find myself feeling an awful lot like Jean Valjean from Les Miserables, craving revenge on those who have harmed me. See, the tricky thing about forgiveness is that I have to really let go and let God handle the situation, trusting in His sovereignty even if it means that He opts to forgive the person who hurt me and that person never has to suffer for the wrong done to me. Part of the beauty of God's grace is that He extends it to everyone equally, but part of the challenge as a human is getting over the desire for human justice to be served.
A key for me in the letting go process has been reminding myself (usually over and over again) that forgiveness does not mean that I am saying what happened was OK. Wrong was still done and I can still call it wrong, but forgivness means that I no longer hold the wrong against the person in my heart, where, quite frankly, it is hurting me much more than it's hurting the person against whom I hold the grudge. My unforgiveness and the resulting bitterness has driven a tangible wedge between God and me which has severely stunted my spiritual growth over the last few years. I have been praying to get back to the place where I was before I let this person too far into my life, and I couldn't understand why God wasn't magically changing my heart until last night when all the hurt and anger came pouring out of me over tortilla chips and a bowl of queso.
I cannot be right with God until I am right with my brothers and sisters (Matthew 5:22-23). When I am allowing anger and bitterness to fester in my heart, this rot subjects me to the same judgment that I am casting on others. The important point here is that I am the one allowing anger and bitterness into my life. God is greater than these things, and I can choose to cast the anger and bitterness out in the name of Jesus instead of silently letting them grow. I have been struggling for years to pray for my enemies as Jesus instructed (Matthew 5:44). I struggle because I find the task of praying blessings into the lives of people at whom I am still angry an impossible mandate. Forgiveness must come first.
On the car ride home from dinner last night, I poured my heart out to God in prayer. I prayed for Him to help me to truly forgive and let go of the hurt and pain that I have been holding onto for far too long. I confessed to Him that I am not strong enough in my humanity to forgive without His help. I praised Him for His grace in granting me free will, as well as for His grace in allowing all of us to know the beauty of the human experience, including our capacity for pain and for healing. In situations where we have been deeply wounded, our prayers to help us forgive may need to be a daily occurance, or even a moment-by-moment occurance. I am committed to giving my wounds up to God as often as necessary until I stop taking them back again and truly let them go. I am committed to this task because I trust God's will, and I am indebted to Him more deeply than I could ever pay for all that He has forgiven me.
But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. --Isaiah 53:5-6
Even though I have been a Christian for my whole life, I still get chills when I think about the sacrifice Christ made for us. And I pray that I would always get goosebumps when I read or hear about what He did for us on the cross, that the tremendous act of love, mercy, and grace would always overwhelm me. I pray for every believer that none of us would ever grow so accustomed to His sacrifice that we take it for granted. Read these words from Isaiah out loud today until they soak into your soul.
I don't know that our feeble minds will ever be able to understand the mystery of God's love, but thankfully, we don't have to. We just have to accept His love and live in a constant state of awe in regards to the grace that covers us so completely without any act of our own. Nichole Nordeman sings "The cradle of the grave could not contain Your Divinity/Neither can I oversimplify this love/Oh, let me not forget to tremble." Let us not ever take our salvation or Christ's work on the cross for granted, but let us fall trembling to our knees in awe and gratitude. He bore out sins so that we wouldn't have to and by His wounds we are healed.
The holiday season has a long-standing reputation of changing the way people treat each other. During Christmas season, people seem cheerier and kinder and more generous. In most cases, anyway. At my school, I work with a large urban and low-income population. The holidays seem to bring about the opposite effect in many of my students who feel more anxiety than joy this time of year. All the commercialism of the holiday season doesn't help the less financially fortunate students who hear the same buzz surrounding gifts that the rest of us hear. Beyond the financial aspect, the pressure to enjoy family time can magnify the dysfunction that many of my students go home to every day.
Regardless of our socio-economic status, the media sells us all many ideas about Christmas. In fact, the media has re-created Christmas into a completely non-religious time of feasting and playing which has done a disservice to all of us, not only the less fortunate. They say it's about getting, they say it's about giving, they say it's about reconnecting with family. In all of this noise, the real meaning of the holiday is lost. While at least the latter two on this list are certainly important and certainly help improve what we call the holiday spirit, none of these ideas is what Christmas is really about. Of course, even Christians purport that the season is all about giving and all about being with family, so it's no wonder that we're all confused. Again, these things are wonderful, but the Christian lifestyle should include these things all year. For Christains, Christmas should be a special time because it is about more than the every day.
Putting the Christ back in Christmas requires recognizing and honoring His birth above and beyond what we do every day. Yes, we can honor Him by honoring each other, but if we forget about Him and think only of each other during this season, then we are missing the point entirely. Luke 2:11 sums up what we are celebrating: "Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord." Christmas is the day we honor the birth of our Savior, without home none of us would have reason or hope, and without whom no light would be found in our dark world. Christmas is an honorary day that marks the beginning of a life that would change the destinies of countless generations of people. Christmas demonstrates God's abundant love for us that He would send His light into the world so that we would have a choice between staying in darkness and walking in the light, between being bound by the chains of our sin and soaring in freedom with Him. Christmas is about God's grace and God's generosity. We can celebrate that through our grace and generosity to each other, but we must be careful that reason behind our celebration doesn't get lost in the cultural noise surrounding the holiday.
Yesterday at church, my pastor discussed the ingratitude that plagues many in our society, and most certainly me. He discussed this problem in the context of Luke 17:11-19. In this story, Jesus heals nine lepers, but only one of the nine returns to thank Him. My pastor asked us if we are only truly grateful to God 10% of the time. How much do we each take for granted in our daily lives? In the spirit of last Thursday's Thanksgiving celebration, he challenged us to think of 24 things for which we are thankful. Here is my list:
1. Jesus. He paid my debt on the cross. Without His sacrifice I would have neither eternal salvation nor a relationship with God. Jesus cleansed me from my sin so that I could come before my Father blameless both now and for eternity. He is my only hope.
2. John. Each morning I wake up and marvel at God's goodness for giving me such a wonderful partner. We fit so well together in so many ways. He has been well worth all of the waiting I did during all my years of singleness.
3. My mom. She has truly been my best friend and closest confidante over the years. Her wisdom, prayers, and humor have dried many a tear and lifted my spirits when they have been at their lowest.
4. My dad. In spite of our differences and conflicts, I was blessed to know him for 24 years. Even since his passing, I continue to learn from him when I reflect on my relationship with him and his life.
5. My brother. For most of my life, I have enjoyed a close relationship with my brother, void of most ot the typical sibling rivalry problems. I am also grateful that he's found a wife who makes him happy even though our relationship has changed as a result.
6. My extened family. I have had the rare blessing of being able to know all four of my grandparents into my early 20's. I am also blessed to have married into a wonderful Christian family.
7. My friends. I remember after I graduated from college and moved back home that I asked God to send me Christian friends. He answered my prayer in a big way by sending me better friends than I could have imagined, friends with whom I can be silly or serious, and with whom I've made many great memories and look forward to many more memories to come.
8. My healthy and functioning body. In spite of my allergies and allergy-induced asthma, I am a healthy person whose amazing body can miraculously survive on a steady diet of chocolate and caffeine. I know I need to take better care of myself, but it is a wonder to me how well I function even when I'm not fueling myself the way I should.
9. My muscles. I may not fit the stereotypical standards of beauty in our culture, but I am strong and sturdy. For as much as I complain about the thickness of my legs, I am grateful that God created me with the heart-healthy pear shape. I am also thankful that I truly enjoy exercising and the feeling of strength I have afterwards.
10. My day job. While there is no doubt that my job is a big stressor, I am thankful to be gainfully employed. I am also thankful that God made my transition from graduate student to full-time counselor so easy by creating an opening for me at the school where I was an intern and therefore already comfortable with the system and the staff. As much as I complain about it, working with teenagers keeps boredom at bay and it's hard to beat the holidays in public education.
11. My coaching job. It may be a big time committment, but I love having the opportunity to be outside and to bond with some pretty amazing young teenage girls. In many ways, this part of my job is the most fulfilling.
12. My dog. Silly, maybe, but my dog really does bring me a lot of joy, and I'm thankful for her.
13. Disposable income. John and I are so blessed to have enough money left over from our paychecks to pay for fun things like expensive dinners out whenever the urge hits and the occasional fun vacation.
14. Our house. John and I are blessed with a roof over our heads in a safe neighborhood. We're also blessed to be moving within the next week to a bigger house in another great location.
15. Food in general. I love to eat, and I love that God has put me in a financial, cultural, and sensory position to enjoy an abundance and variety of wonderful food. I get very excited about a good meal.
16. Education. I am thankful for years of wonderful teachers and professors who gave me not only literacy but also a love of learning and a desire to always learn more.
17. Hot water. It may be simple, but I take hot showers every morning. I don't like to be cold, and I've been completely miserable the few times when I've been forced by plumbing or heatingproblems to a cold shower.
18. Family vacations. Even though the older I got, the more I dreaded the time away from my friends, our annual family vacations to upstate New York were always a time of peace and regrouping for me. Separated from air conditioning, television, and the phone, I learned to enjoy being outside on the water and to appreciate non-eletronic forms of entertainment.
19. Music. I myself am tone deaf and can't clap on rhythm to save my life, but I have a great apprecaition for the music others make that captures my emotions. I have an odd gift for memorizing song lyrics. I can remember being in elementary school art class singing to the other students at my table (probably much to their dismay, although no one ever said anything negative to me about it).
20. Freedom. Not enough can be said about how blessed we are to live in a country with freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to vote for our leaders....All of us take our freedom granted to some degree simply because we've never lived without it, but it is something to be cherished.
21. Change of seasons. I am thankful that I live in an area where the tempertature can fluctuate from under 20 degrees F to over 100 degrees F in the course of year. Over the course of a year, I am blessed to see snow fall, rain pour, leaves change colors, chipmunks and birds scurry about, to feel strong wind gusts and gentle breezes, to hear crickets, wood peckers, and owls go about their business, to be ticked by butterflies and stung by bees, to slip on ice and be drenched in humidity, to smell fresh flowers and decaying leaves.
22. Humor. The ability to laugh at life and to laugh with others about life is sometimes the only thing that gets me through the day.
23. My imagination. I've always had a wild imagination, and it's kept life interesting for me and those who know me. I used to entertain my father by telling him stories when he came to tuck me in at night instead of vice versa. I always wanted to be a creative writer, but my imagination remains too scattered and chaotic to harness and form into an organized document. I'm grateful for it nonetheless.
24. Prayer. Being able to communicate with God and cast all my cares onto Him, being able to lift up other people that God's will would be done in their lives, and being able to connect with people and with God as we lift each other up. Being able to feel God's peace and sense His direction. The hope that comes from knowing that even when I can't do anything about a situation, God can if I ask Him.
After writing this list, I can see why my pastor challenged us to do this. I have so much to be thankful for. God has been so good to me. I have no excuse for my perpetual pessimism.
When you go through deep waters and great trouble, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown! When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you. --Isaiah 43:2
I often cry out to God for protection from the consequences of my sin. Many times He chooses to grant me this protection. When I feel His mercy surrounding me during the times when I know I should feel the fire consuming me, I fall on my knees in gratitude. But I don't always learn my lesson. During those times, I am grateful that God protected me from the suffering I deserve, and I am usually extra-aware of Him for a few days. But soon, I move away from Him again and find myself in the same place I started.
God is not satisfied with the status quo when the status quo in our fallen world is always sin.
Sometimes God displays His grace towards me by protecting me from the fire. Other times, His grace is in the fire. He loves me too much to leave me as I am, and oftentimes change requires suffering. I beg Him to shield me, but in His grace He denies my request because He knows that it is in the fire where I will be refined. Sometimes I must suffer the consequences of my sin in order to draw closer to God. In His grace, He allows my suffering but keeps me from being consumed so that I will emerge changed instead of burned up.
I burst into tears on the way home from work today. But that's not unusual. I have cried at least once a week every week since July 25 because I hate my job so much. I'm depressed for several reasons, the smallest of which is the actual work itself. I'm depressed because I go into work each morning feeling nauseous. At least one person is pissed at me before I even walk in the door at 7am each morning. The hostility I face is unreal to me considering that I taught in a private school for two years where I thought I faced all the hostility one person could handle on a daily basis. Little did I know. I'm depressed because I work my ass off every day for people who will turn around and scream at me in front of their friends at graduation. I'm depressed because I just spent my entire savings account not to mention a great deal of time and energy to become qualified for my current job only to learn when I was no longer a sheltered intern that this job would make me miserable no matter what all the career inventories said before I pursued this path. I'm depressed because my husband and I need my salary and I can't quit without anything else lined up. I'm depressed because I'm qualified for nothing else and I don't have the drive to go back to school yet again because I'm so jaded after this experience. I'm depressed because I'm trapped in my personal and daily hell for another year before I can try to change schools and possibly grade levels to see if I can find a less hostile environment in which to use my training. I'm depressed because no matter how much I think about it, I cannot figure out how I got to this low.
When I got home from work today, I turned to food. Not out of hunger, but out of desparation. Desparation stemming from the same sense of entitlement that I fault the people I work with for--thinking I deserve something better than what I've got. Today, in my fit of self-pitying despair, I used food as my idol when I should have fallen to my knees and cried out to the only One who satisfies the longing inside of me for something more. He has made me different, but I continue to act the same. I wallow in self-pity and food is my companion of choice. No matter how much emptier it leaves me when I finish. Yes, God has offered me a way out, but some days I choose not to take it. Yes, I am in fact quite self-destructive and masochistic by nature. Depression is such familiar ground for me that I don't know what I would do if I suddenly felt contentment for more than a few moments.
Someone once said to me, "He won't follow you into the sin, but He'll be there when you come out." Amen. He doesn't want me to fall, but He allows me to fall because of free will. My sin shows ingratitude for all He's done for me, but He forgives me when I return to Him because of His abounding grace and mercy. I don't deserve it. I deserve suffering on top of my suffering. I deserve to be given over to my ways. But God's grace is all about what I don't deserve. There is no excuse for sin, but there is forgiveness and redemption and new hope available in spite of it.
Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits--who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. --Psalm 103:1-5
I've been overly busy and therefore extremely exhausted lately. The past two weeks at work have been crazy busy and stressful. An end is in sight, though! Once the seniors graduate next Thursday, my life should quiet down a great deal...at least at work. Because I've been so busy and tired, I haven't felt inspired to write much lately, and for that, my two loyal readers, I apologize. Today I decided to do something a bit different. I am going to let you in on my dark side by listing some of vices for all the world to see. Eventually all of our motives and deeds will be brought into the light anyway (1 Corinthians 4:5), so now is as good a time as any to come out of the closet with some of my personal darkness.
1. I am addicted to caffiene. I drink four cups of coffee and 1-2 caffienate beverages a day. And that's after a serious doctor-suggested cut back.
2. I have no patience for some of the people I am supposed to counsel. If they get an attitude with me, I am quick to get one back and resent them for it.
3. I get angry very easily and stay angry very long.
4. I never go a full day without eating chocolate.
5. I tell white lies to protect people's feelings, and I don't think that's wrong.
6. I have shared people's secrets when I thought they made for a good story.
7. I frequently say things to people without first thinking about the consequences of my words.
8. I would rather read a gossip column than a news article.
9. I sometimes say I understand when really I do not.
10. I keep score.
Other not-so-nice facts about me:
1. Really beautfiul women make me feel insecure. I think bad things about them in order to make myself feel better.
2. In college, I used to skip class to go to the gym. I had a deeper desire to look good than I had to become a more interesting person. At the same time I would claim to be enlightened.
3. Even now as an adult, I regularly fantasize about running away. Usually by myself. I've even looked at real estate online.
4. Sometimes the desire to make other people like me dictates my actions. This has been the case for my whole life and has led to some very poor decisions.
5. Ever since puberty, I've been oddly fascinated with death. While some girls doodle flowers and hearts, I've doodled bloody knives on the sides of notebook paper. I have never killed--or even physically hurt--anyone, but I have a dark imagination.
Praise God that in spite of how much darkness I have, He has sent the Light to set me free! Praise God that no matter how hopeless I am, He has given me a new hope (1 Peter 1:3)! Praise God that no matter how set in my dark ways I am, He holds new birth and new life!
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. --Romans 7:14-25
I write a lot about "shoulds" on this site. I examine my life and see areas where I need to grow and become more like Christ. This is important, but I don't want my "shoulds" to take precedent over God's grace in my walk. I don't want to forget and I don't want others to miss God's grace that has covered my "shoulds". His grace is the miracle; my "shoulds" are merely my shoddy attempts to live a more Christ-like life. They will never add up to what His grace has done. Even more, the truth in Paul's words is that as much will and effort as I can muster to live out the "shoulds" in my life, I will inevitably fail because of my humanity. God knew this ahead of time about each of us, which is why He sent us a Savior. It is good to try to live your life by Biblical principles ("shoulds"); it is wrong to measure your own worth or the worth of others by the extent to which these "shoulds" are carried out. Do not be mistaken--"shoulds" do not lead to salvation. The Bible is clear the only way for us to be rescued from our "bodies of death," as Paul writes, is through the grace of our Lord. I attend to the "shoulds" because they're important for my witness to others and for my own growth as a Christian woman. The "shoulds" are not "musts" for my salvation. I praise God that He finished the work of my salvation when He sent Jesus to die for me. The only essential "must" has been done for me so that I can daily struggle with the "shoulds" without having to worry about the "must". I thank Him for His grace, and I plead with Him for help as I try to live my life in deeper gratitude and constant recognition for that gift as I see more and more each day how terribly short my own efforts, like Paul's, fall.