This place is a little bit uncomfortable for me.
The discomfort comes from this unseen nudging. The nudging to be transparent.
Transparency is pretty uncomfortable.
I have always thought that in order to be a good Christian… the kind of Christian that can speak to fellow Christians about the faith, and non-Christians about the beauty and need for the faith… in order to be a good Christian, I had to be, well… good.
I’m not always good. In fact, there are way too many times that I am far from good. I am definitely not good enough to be a representative for the One who has given us all.
Ok, work a little harder…
do a little better ~ a lot better, then, yes, then…
I can do whatever it is that God has planned for me.
I thought ~ as soon as I take my last sip of wine, or my last taste of beer (I am German-blooded and married to an Irish-blooded man, after all)… as soon as I take my last bite of chocolate (ok, chocolate is not a bad thing)… as soon as I stop yelling at my kids… as soon as I say my last cuss word… as soon as I get it together and stop messing up… then, I can be a good Christian and go out and represent Christ and His followers properly.
Here it is…
I’ll never be good enough. All those things don’t keep me in bondage. Those things don’t keep me from getting closer to Him… from hearing Him more clearly… from following Him with my heart wide open. My bondage comes from somewhere else.
What keeps me shackled and slows my running to Him with open arms is not something that I do occasionally. What keeps me in this place of dragging my heels is the uncomfortable. The uncomfortable transparency that comes with being truthful. Speaking the truth about my faith, my heart, my thoughts ~ the fear of looking a bit like a weirdo. The uncomfortable emotions… the unspoken anxiety that I may somehow mess up my kids and be responsible for something ~ anything ~ going wrong in their lives… the unspoken frustrations I feel towards my husband, whom I love dearly… the unspoken fear that I won’t be able to help my aging parents, while my mother’s mind slowly loses the memories that I share with her… the unspoken irritation that I sometimes feel towards fellow believers… the unspoken judgements that spark in my cluttered mind…
If I could just fix all this, well, then I could finally do whatever it is that God has planned for me.
These weaknesses just get in my way.
It’s uncomfortable… the hardships, the difficulties… the truth.
Then, He speaks to my heart. I am hanging on to baggage that is not mine.
…the truth will set you free. (John 8:32)
Oh, He is patient and loving with this child of His.
His grace is sufficient
He opens my eyes to the burdens that weigh my heart down… my heart, in a place that it is not meant to stay. In guilt. In bondage.
What keeps us in bondage is not always so obvious to our searching minds… but, sometimes, those chains are ones we have become so accustomed to wearing that we don’t even recognize them as chains anymore. We trudge on under the weight of our self-imposed burdens… forgetting to give them to God.
Complete surrender… it means just that. Complete surrender.
I don’t have to be good enough… we don’t have to be good enough… we could never be good enough. He loves us just as we are. He welcomes us to come as we are. He has a mighty work… and mighty joy planned for us. Just as we are.
If we would just surrender… all of it. To Him.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
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