COMING CLEAN WITH GOD – Part 2 of 3

What would an X-ray of your soul reveal? Regrets over a teenage relationship? Remorse over a poor choice? Shame about the marriage that didn’t work, the habits you couldn’t quit, the temptation you didn’t resist, or the courage you couldn’t find? Self-imposed guilt lies hidden beneath the surface, festering, irritating. Sometimes so deeply embedded you don’t know the cause.

You become moody, cranky. You’re prone to overreact. You’re angry, irritable. You can be touchy, you know. Understandable, since you have a shank of shame lodged in your soul.

Interested in an extraction? Confess. Request a spiritual MRI. “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties, and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” (Psalm 139:23-24)

As God brings misdeeds to mind, agree with Him and apologize. Let Him apply grace to the wounds. 

-- Max Lucado in “Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine”

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COMING CLEAN WITH GOD – Part 1 of 3

“If we say we have no sin, we are fooling ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, He will forgive our sins, because we can trust God to do what is right. He will cleanse us from all the wrongs we have done.”  (1 John 1:8-9 NCV)

Confession. The word conjures up many images, not all of which are positive. Backroom interrogations. Chinese water torture. Admitting dalliances to a priest who sits on the other side of a screen. Walking down the church aisle and filling out a card. Is this what John had in mind?

Confession is not telling God what He doesn’t know. Impossible. Confession is not complaining. If I merely recite my problems and rehash my woes, I’m whining. Confession is not blaming. Pointing the fingers at others without pointing any at me feels good, but it doesn’t promote healing.

Confession is so much more. Confession is a radical reliance on grace. A proclamation of our trust in God’s goodness. “What I did was bad,” we acknowledge, “but Your grace is greater than my sin, so I confess.” If our understanding of grace is small, our confession will be small: reluctant, hesitant, hedged with excuses and qualifications, full of fear of punishment. But great grace creates an honest confession. 

-- Max Lucado in “Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine”

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LOVE IS A JOURNEY, NOT A DESTINATION

“Walk in love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us…”  (Ephesians 5:2)

We often think, at least unconsciously, that when we finally fall in love and decide to share our lives with another person, everything in our lives will fall into place. We'll "settle down," as we say, and, the implication is, we'll stay settled until "death do us part."

I call this the Shoe Box Notion of love. In this view, a relationship is like a shoe box… in which you keep something precious like your wedding bouquet. You wrap the flowers in tissue paper, put them in the box, … and hope the contents will stay just as they are forever and a day.

Unfortunately, this is precisely how many of us think about relationships. We put our love in a shoe box, stash it, and imagine we can retrieve it unchanged anytime we want. We think we don't have to do anything to make sure it doesn't get moldy or moth-eaten.

In truth, however, a relationship is a journey and not a destination. It begins with a love that captures our attention and ignites our passion, and goes through the innumerable and unending undulations and permutations that give it texture, character, and spice, and which, without our necessarily liking or expecting it, shape and reshape the two people who created it…

A relationship is about movement, growth; it is a holy interpersonal environment for the transformation of two souls.

-- Daphne Rose Kingma in “True Love”

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THE ALL-POWERFUL GOOD SHEPHERD – Part 2 of 2

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”  (Psalm 23:5-6 NKJV)

King David, who wrote Psalm 23, had taken on a lion and a bear and pounded them into the ground (Samuel 17:34-36). David understood what God said when He promised to be with us through the valley of the shadow of death. Jesus is there in the midst of the pressure with us, and He’s not just standing around with His hands in His pockets. The Good Shepherd is there to rescue us when necessary, to protect us at all costs, and to fill our cups to overflowing. We don’t need to watch over our shoulders anymore. God prepares a table for us in the midst of our enemies. Jesus is watching them, guarding us, so we can keep our attention fully fixed on the face of the Good Shepherd – Jesus, our Savior. 

-- Louie Giglio in “Don’t Give the Enemy a Seat at Your Table” 

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THE ALL-POWERFUL GOOD SHEPHERD – Part 1 of 2

“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.… Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.”  (Psalm 23:1,4 NKJV)

I grew up in a big church in downtown Atlanta. When I was twelve, I remember being in our seventh-grade boy’s Sunday school room. Tan linoleum floor. Cinderblock walls, also tan. Metal folding chairs. Maps of Paul’s missionary journeys on the wall. A window with blinds -- always closed. And on the far wall a big painting of the “meek and mild” Jesus. You know what I’m talking about? His face was pale. He looked like He hadn’t been outside in a long time. His robe was perfect. His hair was perfect. He had a woolly lamb on His shoulders and a crook in His hand -- and Jesus was gazing off into Foreverland with a faraway look in His eyes. But Olan Mills Portrait Studios Jesus is nothing like the real thing.

He’s your hero. Your defender. He’s the mighty Son of God! When you are up against life and death, when your back’s against a wall, when circumstances are poised to take you out, and when the Devil is whispering lies in your ear, you need to know there’s an all-powerful Good Shepherd with a rod in one hand and a staff in the other. That’s the Jesus of Psalm 23. That’s why we find comfort in His presence. With that staff, the Good Shepherd can grab you and pull you to safety. And with that rod, He can crush any prowling lion or raging bear that charges you. 

-- Louie Giglio in “Don’t Give the Enemy a Seat at Your Table” 

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