I’m going to try to be brief. Let me rephrase that…I’m going to try to attempt to attempt to be brief. (That really does makes sense if you read it carefully. I think.)
Initially I was going to write about this past month…and the burden I’d carried over the past few weeks. It was the burden of not feeling worthy. Worthy as man, as a Christian and as God’s intentional creation. I couldn’t get past the idea that I just wasn’t worthy of His love. (I don’t want to get into theology here, and I know that statement is an excellent gateway into an excellent discussion/debate…but I’m just going to leave it there for right now.)
I’ve been hard on myself over the past few weeks. And not in a, “We have to be hard on ourselves sometimes…it’s how we grow” kind of way. It was more along the lines of an “Everytime I experience God’s love I want to run and hide…and punish myself when it’s over because I’m not worthy, because I basically abandon Him and His love daily” kind of thing. And that’s not healthy.
I don’t ever want to retreat from His love. Ever. In fact, that’s the only thing I really want. Yet, I was retreating from it. I just couldn’t accept it, or myself, or…I don’t know…I just couldn’t seem to allow myself to soak in it.
And so I was going to blog about that, to let you all in on what I was truly feeling and thinking as I preapre to spend a year serving our God. And I was going to use an excellent excerpt from Pete Gall’s book My Beautiful Idol, but I’m not going to blog about it…at least not anymore than I already have, because that all changed this weekend.
Between this past Sunday and Monday something in me just broke. My own personal love dam maybe. I don’t really know. But something finally stopped trying to wall out God’s love. (And I’m still kind of amazed He didn’t let up on showing me His love during that time…not once…as He has continued to pour into me and pour into me, despite the battle I’ve been fighting in my own head and heart.)
I don’t know exactly what caused that dam to break, but I think a lot of it had to do with the people I was with. Somehow God used their love to blindside me…to speak to my heart and to awaken the truth in my spirit once again. I am worth loving because God chooses to love me. And nothing will ever stop that, least of all my own inner dialogues. (Wow…as I’m rereading that sentence right now, I realize I’m rediscovering the gospel. Good thing too seeing as I’m planning on sharing that with hundreds or thousands of other people in the next year. 😉 )
And the best part about it all isn’t just that I’ve started to allow myself to be loved, but that there is freedom with that. Freedom as practical as not taking on guilt for receiving fund-raising checks. Freedom to not be perfectly prepared for what lies ahead. Freedom to not have all the answers. There is freedom in love. And I knew this before…but it just got buried somewhere. Before this trip even left thge ground I was already making it about doing, and not about being. And I want my life to be based in being….being loved by God, being used by Him, being a lover of His children, being in love with Him…and letting life happen out of all of that.
So today I move forward in God’s love…that I’m imperfect. That I’m not qualified, and that in some bizarre God way, that qualifies me. And that brings a smile to my lips….and makes me want to dance and sing in thanks. I love you Daddy! I love that you are relentless with me. Relentless and patient. Thank you, thank you, thank you for your love. You are my favorite thing and you are worthy of my life and my praise! You are good, you are good, you are so so good!!!
