As I sit here looking out a window at the snow covered, jaw dropping sight of the Himalayan Mountain range in Nepal, I can’t help but reflect on where my life was two years ago, and how starkly different it is.
Two years ago, I was getting into yet again another relationship. It was a relationship I should have never picked up for many reasons. He wasn’t a believer. I wasn’t ready for a relationship because I was still seeking my fulfillment in men rather than in Christ.
God had called me to Himself nearly nine months earlier. After battling with carrying a large burden from my family for nearly three years; boyfriends who were unfaithful as well as physically, emotionally and mentally abusive, depression that led to outbursts of attempted self harm and cries for help, and drinking too much, I had finally thrown my hands up in the air. I demanded an answer to the question, “What now God? If you’re there, where am I supposed to go when everything and everyone has failed me?”
“I am the lover of your soul and the healer of your scars. Stop running to a mirage of refuge, run to me. It’s Me you’re looking for. I AM.”
At that point, He saved me from a hopeless future. He had saved me from having no future at all because of my depression. He had finally offered me a resting place to lay down the loads I was carrying.
And then nearly a year later, there I was, running after the creation instead of the Creator. Asking this man who didn’t know Jesus to fill the hole my family, ex-boyfriends and past hurts had left. I wanted to be loved so terribly, that I forgot about my God and my Refuge.
Desire leads to sin, and sin leads to death. I died in that relationship. I became a slave to fear and insecurity. I so desperately tried to hold on to something that I didn’t even like anymore. A man who had seemed to be someone I could build a life with, had taken over the Lord’s throne in my life, a place he was never big enough or made to fill – and he failed. He took when I so obviously didn’t want to give. And I let him. As the Devil stood cracking his whip, I slowly died and became the person I was before I had ever been touched by God, maybe even worse. And that’s when I realized the depth of the gospel. The God who had saved me from family burdens, depression and abuse was still pursuing me even after I had blatantly turned my back on him for this man.
The scales were peeled back from my eyes and the freedom of the gospel shook me. I was changed. I stood in awe of what the cross really meant. He had stood by me even when I continually slapped Him in the face and walked away to worship someone other than Him.
At the top of this mountain, there is a Hindu temple. It stands demanding attention with its position and intricate detail. One could easily spend time looking at it, and maybe even possibly enjoying it for a while. But eventually, the details are no longer interesting and you recognize this is a place of death for the people who worship it. You start to see it for what it really is.
It’s at that point you look up, and realize that off in the distance are the majestic mountains washed with white snow. Here was a temple attempting to claim it’s own glory, but stands insignificantly without allure in stark contrast to the mountains.
You completely forget the temple that was once captivating, as you stand in the presence of something so much greater and more beautiful.
That’s the life of Christ. That is Christ. How beautiful is He who stands over us sinners clothed in white. How beautiful is the life He has for us when we finally look up at the One who covers our scarlet stained lives of sin and brokenness with His white coat of righteousness.
Consider today what dark temple you’re staring at, and what magnificent view God is calling you to look at instead?
