real forgiveness

Sitting in Frontline tonight, I didn't expect to be convicted. It was a communion message on forgiveness. Mike Kelsey (one of the pastors) taught out of Colossians 2:

"And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross."
Colossians 2:13-14

Two powerful verses, but verses I've heard before, and know well and (think I) understand. After driving back to DC from Ohio I was tired and not ready to be engaged in worship or in the sermon. Of course, it's times like these,  in moments where we think we know everything, that we are often hit smack in the face with how little we know and understand. For better or worse, I've been a Christ follower nearly my entire life. My faith has gone through valleys and over mountaintops but it's always provided the foundation for my life. The priviledge of growing up in the church isn't something I take lightly, but sometimes I think it's made me overly confident in my understanding of a lot of basic Christian principles.

The older I get the more I realize I have a lot of head knowledge but not as much soul knowledge of Christ. Forgiveness is a prime example and the Lord reminded me tonight of how much more I have to learn about forgiving like He forgives. I think I've even written on this blog how forgiveness comes naturally to me. In some ways this is true. I typically don't hold grudges or stay angry very long, but not "being mad" anymore isn't forgiveness--which is what Mike Kelsey jarred me out of my seat with tonight. It's easy to not be mad at someone anymore, but real forgiveness--Colossians 2:14 forgiveness--is entirely diffrent. It's looking a person in the eye and saying you are no longer indebted to me for whatever sin or crime or hurt you've inflicted on me. It's extending the grace Christ extended us on the cross, by bearing the payment for everything we owed, owe, and will continue to owe God.

When I reconsider forgiveness in this way, I realize I'm not as good at it as I like to think. Sure, it's easy to forgive the small things. But the people who've hurt me beyond the superficial, by what they've said or done or not done to me, those people I don't forgive quite as easily, especially when I feel like that person isn't genuinely sorry for what they did. Time numbs anger, it dulls hate, but time doesn't enable forgiveness. Only our heavenly Father can equip us to forgive unconditionally, in the way He has forgiven us with Christ's sacrifice. Once again, it isn't about me being able to do this or that, it's about me being able to surrender my hurt. It's about Christ filling me up and showing me what real forgiveness means in a practical sense.

Hard to realize that I'm not there yet with a few people...

"Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive" Colossians 3:12-13

you raise me up

It seems mildly cliche to post on being thankful on Thanksgiving day, but I'm sitting in my family room with my family and browsing through YouTube and Josh Groban's "You Raise Me Up" just popped up. The song makes the hair on my arms stand up within the first couple of notes:

When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary;
When troubles come and my heart burdened be;
Then, I am still and wait here in the silence,
Until you come and sit awhile with me.
You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up: To more than I can be.

These words are so familiar, but powerful all the same. How often we walk through life feeling soul weary, feeling burdened. Skipping over the waiting in silence and going straight to focusing on the stormy seas comes so naturally. Still, our Heavenly Father is waiting all the while. Waiting to raise us up. Waiting to make us more than we can be on our own. In dark seasons of our lives it's so incredibly easy to miss this beautiful truth. We have a Savior who waits upon us. How paradoxical? After a few months of navigating one of the worst storms of my life, I've finally begun to see how the Lord has been raising me up even amidst the storm. So today I'm thankful for having a God, a God who I worship, a God who created the very world I live in every day, who loves me enough to wait upon me.

"Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him..." Psalm 37:7a

equipped to love differently?

A while back, I walked through a fairly in-depth study of the book of Genesis. One of the most impactful lessons I learned from that study remains Genesis 2, when God creates man and woman. "It is not good for man to be alone," He proclaims, and then proceeds to form Eve from a rib taken from Adam's side. There are so many things we can learn about God and about men and women from these few verses.

What stands out to me though, and what my life circumstances seem to have been confirming over the past several months, is that God fashioned men and women with different parts of Himself. In many ways we are incredibly similar, but women have been gifted with the servant's spirit of our Savior. And more and more it seems to me that God gave women the ability to love differently than men.

Women's hearts are fascinating. Mysterious. Even to us as women. I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out why this is lately, and the best thing I can come up with is that as a born again Christian woman, my heart is different from my brothers' in Christ hearts. To fully understand my own heart would be to fully understand God in a way that I can't. This is exciting and frightening. Exciting because I can love without abandon in a way akin to my Savior. Exciting because the more I get to know my Lord the more I come to understand myself. Still, frightening because I also have to be wise and judicious with my love. Two qualities that seem to go directly against unabandoned love, or a least lay down a few good sized hurdles.

So how do I reign in a heart I cannot fully know? How do I guard my heart as the well spring of life as my Lord calls me to in Proverbs 4? Two ways: get in the Word to write it on my heart, and moment-by-moment surrender to allow God to rule my heart instead of trying to rule it myself.

"Watch over your heart with all diligence for from it flow the springs of life." Proverbs 4:23

a Psalm of brokeness

wrote this during one of the hardest times of my life...

"A Plea to my Father"

Who am I to even open my lips,
or raise my hands in praise to you?
I am nothing.
My heart is always after evil.
My spirit a slave to itself.
I am unworthy to call you friend;
Let alone Father, or Savior.
You have this crazy perfect love for me.
But at the smallest glimpse,
the smallest taste,
the smallest hope of love,
My heart turns from you to another.
Woe am I, a sinner.
Who am I? Undeserving.
Would that You reach down and slay me.
My actions bring nothing but shame to your name.
I no longer deserve this precious gift of life.
I never did.
I cannot reconcile myself.
I cannot explain myself.
I cannot justify myself.
For I know how to think, speak, act;
Yet I do otherwise,
Running after the attention of men,
Instead of pursuing obedience in You.
My spirit is broken by my own weakness.
My mouth speaks words,
So many words,
But what is my heart?
I am at war.
Help me or I will be broken forever.
Rescue me.
Show me mercy,
Help me accept it.
I cannot live apart from You.
And I long to be nothing more than a drink offering.
Poured out constantly for you.
Unconcerned with any part of this present world.
Circumstantial comfrot is wasted upon me.
Break me of myself.
I want to be glad for no one but You.
Submit my soul to Yourself, even amidst these trials.
Take everything from me but Yourself.
Because this--this life, this existence, this world--is not about me.
It never was.
It never will be.
You are my only hope.