Tag: Sin

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The Fear of Death

Death is the last topic I thought I’d be writing about to kick off my blog’s second year. Yet, here we are; the highest highs always seem to bring to my mind the lowest lows right along with them. And perhaps that’s just as it should be. 

I’ve been taking morning walks lately, and one morning this week I walked to a park I haven’t been to for years, just outside of a well-manicured neighborhood. The park is all woodland, with a creek running through it. Once inside under the completely shaded canopy, I saw that the park itself seemed a completely different world from the sunny neighborhood just beyond. Instead of neatly trimmed grass, there was a mess of moss and fungi blanketing rotting logs. Instead of bushes full of blooms, there were downed trees with their roots exposed, brutally ripped up from the earth beneath. Instead of small blue jays or cardinals hopping about, there were two large, hulking black vultures, still and silent, perched in a pile of fallen leaves above the creek. 

These starkly different scenes just yards from each other perfectly illustrate how death and reminders of it are consciously kept out of sight and ignored as much as possible. 

Death is uncomfortable to think about.

Given how prevalent and obvious death is in this world, I’m interested in why this remains so. I certainly don’t have all the answers, but I do know that we all have an innate sense of the fragility of our lives and our loved ones’ lives. 

Even so, we have to keep surviving, right? No time to think about death when we’re trying to survive. However, there comes a point at which facing death becomes absolutely key to fully embracing our humanity.    

According to the Bible, humans gave up the option to ignore the knowledge of good and evil long ago (Genesis 3:6); we simply don’t have the luxury anymore of being unconscious of it. In a podcast interview, psychologist Jordan Peterson posed the idea that perhaps the remedy now is to be fully or “all the way” conscious of good and evil, since we can’t go back to being “unconscious.” I like this idea, but whether it’s correct or not I think it holds true with the Good News of Christ.

Along with the knowledge of good and evil comes a responsibility to face the good and evil in us.

To face the evil in us could also be described as becoming conscious of our own sin. This is exactly what we must understand before we can sincerely repent; C.S. Lewis talks about this in Mere Christianity. We realize the extent of our sin (evil) and the extent to which we need God’s grace (good) to free us from death’s grip. 

For repentance to come, we need to do something God didn’t design us to do–to stare death in the face. It is when we really see that the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23)–and that death forces us into something we were not created for–that we can understand all that we’ve been saved from by Jesus and how truly amazing His grace really is. 

Turning from our willful ignorance of death to follow Jesus, the Master of death, means we will stop avoiding it and trust that He’s bigger than death itself, as well as every one of our fears.

If we knew the Master of death better, we wouldn’t be so afraid of our own death. 

Jesus came to master death and set us free. To use the woodland analogy, Jesus came to lay His life down, like a fallen tree in the forest, that we might live like a newly sprouted seed from the soil He provided by His act of love. 

Yet, death is still worthy of being sad about, something to deeply mourn and to grieve. Separation from loved ones, though temporary for believers in Jesus, is still deeply painful and still very much a loss. I want to be very clear that it is okay to grieve, mourn, and be sad when it comes to death, no matter who it is, whether or not they were believers. Grief is not something to be brushed aside or ignored.  

When my Jewish grandfather passed away years ago, I was able to experience a community that faced death together in a beautiful way. The love and support of my grandmother’s friends and family was hugely beneficial, even for me in my own grieving process, as they came to simply be present and literally “sit” with her. Shiva following a Jewish burial typically lasts for seven days, providing not only community support but food for the grieving first-degree relatives. 

There is great value in appreciating the seriousness and weight of death and taking time to acknowledge what our hearts are feeling. 

While our culture has lost the skill of being open about death and understanding of grief, we don’t have to when we stay close to Jesus and understand the truth He brings–that death is not the end. Jesus Himself spoke openly about death. He was not afraid to do so, predicting his own death several times. People who had experienced death also came to him in a state of grief. He didn’t turn them away but even grieved with them (John 11:35). He even chose to raise the sick girl (Matthew 9:25), and His friend Lazarus (John 11:44) back to life. 

While I don’t think it is healthy for death to be excessively avoided as a topic of conversation, I also want to make a point to say that an excessive focus on death is not the answer to any problems either. It is only by understanding how God intended life that we can understand death and see it for what it is, no more, and no less. Romanticization of death glorifies the wrong god. 

Life is a gift from God. 

Examining our feelings about death along with the truth of the Bible can give us a deeper appreciation of life and its meaning. Reading Genesis, we find that death as we know it was never meant to be. We were not built for it! We were created to walk with God and eat from the Tree of Life. Death was not in the original plan. 

It is no wonder that it can be so devastating to us psychologically, physically, and spiritually! Knowing this, it is completely natural to avoid death, and it makes perfect sense that we would brush traces of death aside because innately we know what we were intended for.  

Facing death is so hard because God never intended for us to experience it in the first place. 

Death may never stop being hard to face, but it need not take us by surprise, as it so often does. With Jesus’ wisdom and grace, we can explore our knowledge of good and evil. 

We can let Him help us through to the other side of fear as we examine what He says about life and death. We can begin to safely open ourselves up to facing the realities of death when we trust Jesus and His love for us, for there is no fear in love (1 John 4:18). 

Christ and His love sets us free.

The bigger the debt of sin we have been forgiven from, the more we will love Jesus for canceling it. The story in Luke 7 gets me every time, when Jesus forgave the sinful woman with the alabaster jar of perfume. 

Her display of gratitude for forgiveness led Jesus to tell those in His company, “...Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little” (Luke 7:47). When we are conscious and aware of our sins, fully acknowledging our need like this woman, gratitude for our canceled debt leads us to a life full of love and peace. 

As I was headed back from that morning walk in the decaying woodland park, walking once again past neatly spaced out trees and colorful blossoms, these words came to my heart, “All that was lost will be restored to you.” 

That is what God does; He restores what is lost, damaged, sick, even dead, in and for us. 

The very first book of the Bible that was written was Job, which speaks to and confirms this simply, “If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored . . .” (Job 22:23).

The last book of the Bible speaks of the restored life that God will bring to His people: “[His servants] will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads” (Revelation 22:4). How amazing that the story (which is not ours but God’s) that is unfolding will end in God calling us, servants created to glorify and enjoy Him, by His own name. 

Think of the intimacy of giving someone else your name, or of taking someone else’s. That is the intimacy God intends for us to have with Him. What vulnerability and trust to be called by His name! Death is not the end, but rather this beautiful picture of restored, everlasting life in the family of God.

“For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his” (Romans 6:5). 

Thank you for spending some of your time journeying with me. If you haven’t yet, please subscribe to the blog, it helps me continue writing about Life with the King. Grace and peace.  

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The Profound Sufficiency of Christ

The ugliness of this world has been exposed, maybe more than anyone alive today has ever seen, in these draining days of COVID-19, political unrest, and violence. Quarreling in and among friends over how to think about these issues seems to be the new norm. 

My soul, along with that of many others, is heavy for this world. The impact of the many stresses on society takes a toll on us individually, with deep uncertainty about the future. There is still no clear end in sight. This is nothing new under the sun, yet aspects are new to us and the globe. 

Can our souls find real rest in this kind of world? We will not find answers in delusion, nor will we will find them in the world itself. This world has never been sufficient to fulfill us, and that truth is now starkly apparent to all who are willing to see. 

I’ve been struck this week with the profound truth of Christ’s sufficiency, and wanted to share thoughts about His infinite goodness, even in the face of 2020. He knew of all the suffering and pain that would happen this year; He endured the painful weight of it on the cross long ago.   

What does Christ’s declaration, “My grace is sufficient” (2 Corinthians 12:9) mean for us?

There is hope in the midst of pain, even now! Especially now. Let us pause for a moment and let it sink in that even now, God has already provided for us, our every need, by His infinite grace. How immeasurable His grace is to completely cover the pain of this world! 

We can’t earn or make fulfillment for ourselves in this world no matter how much we try. There is no perfect human system that will “fix” everything or “solve the problems.” Should we still try? Absolutely. We certainly must seek justice and defend the oppressed (Isaiah 1:17) in every way we can. However, the world’s problems all stem from sin, which only Christ has the authority to address. Putting all of our hope (and attention) in human solutions will do nothing but let us down again.  

Hope that lasts can only be found in Christ. 

Christ Jesus declared through the Apostle Paul that His grace is sufficient. He has provided for the lasting fulfillment of each and every soul by addressing the sin that plagues it head on. His grace is sufficient to cover our sin–and the vast chasm that formed between us and God the Father when sin entered humanity. 

To clarify, I do not believe that God is at fault for our sin in any way. This world the way it is is not the result of God’s mess-up. I believe that after humans chose to sin, God then had a choice to make, and chose for sin to operate the way it does now for the ultimate good of all; as it is written, “For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all” (Romans 11:32).

It is God’s character not to set us up for failure, but to show us all His great mercy. 

His grace is sufficient to give us hope for a future in the presence of our merciful, good, loving Father. What Paul says in 2 Corinthians 12 of the sufficiency of Jesus speaks of hope in the midst of frustrating human limitation:        

“Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 

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” (2 Corinthians 12:7b-10).

I can’t help but think of COVID-19 and long-standing physical violence as similar both to Paul’s “thorn” and to the “weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties” he endured. Disease and violence have plagued humanity for millennia, and they have clearly not gone away. Yet, by Jesus’ sufficient grace, we like Paul can delight even when these things are upon us. Jesus gives us the ability to delight in our lives in 2020!

Christ is not just sufficient to ease our minds about an afterlife, He is sufficient to give us life in the present. 

Romans 8:35 says that even tribulation, distress, persecution, danger, and sword are unable to separate us from the love of Jesus. His love and grace are what truly provide for our souls, which die without hope. Hopelessness and depression in this life are some of the worst things imaginable. Jesus continually meets us in this soul level struggle, meeting our deepest needs and insufficiencies today. 

As we walk through life today, let us take hope in the amazing truth that Christ Jesus is sufficient for us. Even and perhaps particularly amidst weakness and difficulty, He is sufficient. Jesus may not take away this world’s troubles (John 16:33) immediately, but He provides unending grace that is sufficient to satisfy our souls’ longing for fulfillment and hope.   

Jesus is enough to cover every need.

His goodness is vast enough to cover all that our own human goodness cannot. He is sufficient to cover every longing. He is sufficient to give us hope.

Christ is sufficient. 

By His sufficient grace, may Jesus change our hearts, strengthening us to step into life, freedom, and hope right where we are today.

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

“…If God is for us who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn?” (Romans 8:31b-34a).

“…in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, not angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:37-39). 

Thank you for spending some of your time journeying with me. If you haven’t yet, please subscribe to the blog, as it really helps me continue writing about Life with the King. Grace and peace to you.

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Justice, Jesus, and the Human Heart

The shockwaves of the nation have hit my heart deeply. They have exposed the lurking darkness within each one of us. The ugliness has made clear that we’re not where we need to be. We’re not treating every human equally. We’re not loving our neighbors as ourselves.

2020 seems to have brought the perfect storm of tragedy, and I’m still reeling. I’m still processing. But I hope to start in this post to express the grief I’m feeling for and with my brothers and sisters, and to point to the hope Jesus provides us, even still. I willingly join with Christ, my brothers, and my sisters, in the suffering that comes with standing for both justice and mercy. It seems to me to be the only way to leave the darkness behind for good. 

“Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer” (2 Timothy 2:3-4). 

This has nothing to do with politics, and everything to do with people. Where there are people suffering, God is there. As God’s people we need to be there too. We will know and feel what His heart feels as His Spirit dwells within us. Walking with Jesus means walking not only outside of the affairs of the world, but also straight into the affairs of the heart. There is no place more earthly than the heart, and God is now allowing this battleground, where evil has long prevailed, to be stormed. While it is not our job to change others’ hearts, for only God can do that, it is our job to speak truth in love. Speaking truth in love is just, loving, and humble. 

“He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). 

After hundreds of years of His people in slavery, God called Moses to lead them out of their oppressive conditions and treatment in Egypt. I believe God is calling our country and the world to face the oppression inflicted upon one another, whether that’s physically, mentally, emotionally, socially, economically, opportunistically, or otherwise. All of it needs to be reexamined; all of it needs to be changed for the better. And we can do better because Jesus made a way for hearts to be changed, purified by His blood, and set on the good of all.

Jesus is the Way to love our neighbors as ourselves.

God said to Cain of the sin in his heart, “you must rule over it” (Genesis 4:7). 2000 years have passed since Jesus made a way to be set free from that sin. If we are free of it, why is it still lingering? Sin forms habits too. But habits can be broken. In fact, studies have shown that it takes only about 21 days to break most habits. The events of these past weeks have been a challenge to individually break the habit of seeing others as less than ourselves. 

We must make a new habit, that of loving others as ourselves. It is one of the two highest commands of God (Matthew 22:39). And He has made a Way for us to rule over our human tendency for sin and to love instead. He has made it possible, we must intentionally break the ingrained habit and make it our reality. This true reality of loving our neighbors as we walk in the Kingdom of God is where we can live and be fully alive.  

“Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:37-39).  

It is not a time to be afraid, the life lived for and in the Kingdom is better than any other life we may be used to or comfortable with. In the Kingdom of God, we are no longer bound to the life for a life system of justice. We see this with Israel, the firstborn of God, being spared in exchange for the death of the firstborn of Egypt. Jesus ended that cycle when He became the ultimate sacrifice for our sin. 

Deaths and animal sacrifice no longer need to occur to atone for our sin, because Jesus, the sinless One, broke our cycle of brokenness. Jesus brought a Way to the entire earth that rescues our sinful, arrogant, prideful, prejudiced souls from the darkness, and brings them to the light in Him. By His power, and only by His power, we can overcome sin and death. 

“So do not be afraid of them, for there is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight; what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs. Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matthew 10:26-28). 

Right before the 10th and final plague God brought upon Egypt, He reassured Moses: “Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Pharaoh will not listen to you, that my wonders may be multiplied in the land of Egypt’” (Exodus 11:9). My prayer is that all of these horrors, all of this pain and suffering, all of the oppression and bondage in sin and darkness would powerfully bring to light the wonder of God to us in our land. As God’s sovereignty and wonder was made apparent in Egypt, may it be made apparent and bring Him all the glory in our world today. May we take comfort and joy in the fact that God multiplies His wonders out of the most dire situations. 

Friends, let’s keep our eyes on the light of the Lord’s promises, even in the midst of deepest darkness. 

“But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:24). 

“With all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with each other in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:2-3). 

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). 

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The Truth about Philosophy and Mental Health

Just for a moment, imagine you are in the process of figuring out your beliefs. You know you will use them and navigate decisions with them, for the rest of your life. Imagine that you look at the world’s beliefs with all their opinions, ideologies, and religions. How do you decide what beliefs are true? 

Any belief that we take on can have serious consequences for our spirit, and in turn, our mental health. 

Beliefs impact our well-being, mentally and emotionally. What we believe internally, meaning our expectations and hopes, carry serious weight and are just as important as our external, circumstantial experience of being. If we treat our beliefs with too little importance, eventually they will catch up with us. According to psychologist Jordan Peterson, when our internal and external worlds don’t align enough or are misaligned for too long, serious psychological pathology can result.  

The passage below from Colossians triggered a turning point in my thinking about what I believe: 

“So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and in Christ you have been brought to fullness” (Colossians 2:6-9). 

When I read it, this passage shockingly spoke directly to my past, in which philosophy was my bible for navigating life. The human ways of knowing that philosophy offered completely charmed me. It seemed comfortingly detached, logical, and rational, something I could stand on as a marker when the tide of my personal feelings made me drift away from reality. In philosophy, everything must be explained, justified, and correct. If an idea stood the test of philosophical debate, I thought it must be right, at least right enough for me to believe in. 

I failed to realize in time that philosophy must be used as a tool and not be made a god. 

People use philosophy as a way to get to the truth of something. That’s why it appealed so much to me; I wanted to get to the truth. The truth about philosophy, however, is that it is only a tool, which has a place. We must not confuse it, however, with the truth itself. 

Many Christians fear learning philosophy, likely with the assumption that it will make them pick apart every belief they have about God with human logic. People do not like their beliefs to be challenged. Of course, enjoying the ego thrill, I dove right into philosophy when I started having questions and doubts about God. What could be so scary about philosophy if the stories about Jesus were true, right?

However, I soon realized that philosophy wasn’t concerned with the truth about Jesus. Instead, it pulled me into a whole other set of concerns altogether, and slowly, I was trained in its way of thought. Much like an ideology or religion. 

Soon I was thinking philosophically about everything, and putting it in that highest place for truth that it simply wasn’t meant for. Philosophy made me feel powerful. It made me feel like I could argue my way past any belief. It made me feel like I was too good for beliefs. 

Sin causes our thoughts and feelings to deceive us about who we are.

Philosophy is one of the fastest ways to an unhealthy pride in oneself that I know of. It made me feel like I didn’t need God. My identity became wrapped up in my philosophical ability. 

Of course, I was naive about approaching philosophy, which is perhaps why it became so dangerous. I am certain many others approach philosophy in a very healthy way and thus have no qualms about using it. Today, I can say that there is no reason to be afraid of philosophy if one can see it as the tool it is. But, if we use it as the standard by which we make decisions and judgments, that is where it can cause damage to mental health. 

Human knowledge does not equal divine wisdom. 

Fast forward a couple of years and my mental health was declining. Jordan Peterson describes it as a sort of “sickness of the spirit.” I suspect there were other factors involved too, but I am sure that at least part of the reason was that my expectations about life did not match up with my hopes. 

Why wasn’t philosophy “working” for me? Why weren’t those feelings of superior knowledge manifesting in a better life? 

In fact, they’d only led me to a place where I was no longer searching for meaning and thus was simply unhappy. Philosophical thinking hadn’t improved my life, instead it seemed to weaken it. At the time, I could not understand why. 

Thankfully, God didn’t let me forget Him. I looked for the people who were happy, desperate for something to help ease my mental suffering. I tried to learn from them. In talking to Jesus-following believers, God challenged me to seek the whole truth found in Him, not just parts of the truth that philosophy grasps for. That’s when I discovered the truest thing I could find in this world; a deep, meaningful relationship that He wants to have with each one of us. 

It wasn’t logic-centered, it wasn’t calculated. It was messy and beautiful and scary and wonderful. The truth was more like relationship and art and less like philosophy and logic than I ever imagined.  

“Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?” (1 Corinthians 1:20).

All my philosophical beliefs crumbled under the authority of God in this one brutal, beautiful verse.  

Indeed, God made all the most advanced, complex brilliance of human knowledge foolish when it comes to understanding His Kingdom. Whereas philosophy locks us into something rigidly, relationship with God frees us. “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Corinthians 3:17). 

No one can be happy if they aren’t free. We were created to have free will, and to make our own choices about what we believe. We must take special care when considering any religion, ideology, or theory–it will affect our very souls and our psychological well being. 

The wisdom of the world is opposite to the wisdom of God.

Jesus Himself delighted in the simplicity of the Gospel in Luke 10: “At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do . . .’” (Luke 10:21).

He makes it possible to understand who He really is whether you can wield human logic or not. He desires relationship with each precious soul in a profoundly personal way. Who or what others tell you He is shouldn’t matter more than who He has revealed Himself to you to be. God can reach us through any means, including human understanding and logic, but that is certainly not the only way. If that was the case only the smartest people in the world would be able to find Him and know Him. He ensured that little children can know Him too. The pursuit of intellect for its own sake will not bring us closer to Him. The pursuit of Him will always lead us to Him.  

How beautiful and fair and just God is! He gives us all an equal chance to have a relationship with Him. In Him, there is no class or status or ranks. Only love and our choice to love Him as He already first loved and loves and will love us. 

God wants us to know Him. 

Whereas a reliance on philosophy to tell us what’s true will leave our souls wanting, God restores our souls. He gives us life breath. He calls us into our true identity in Jesus Christ. He sends the comforter and friend, the Holy Spirit, to be with us and to fill us so we can stand firm in faith in the face of trials.  

If you’re wrestling with existential questions right now, you are not alone. But take heart that your wrestle shows that you are well on your way to finding the peace of God that transcends all understanding (Philippians 4:7). 

I would invite you to take a moment to reflect on what God might be communicating to you through the question you are asking. What is He is up to in our souls when we have these questions? How can we bring our felt experience into better alignment with the greatest hopes you have, in the fullness of God, in abundant life?  

During this Holy Week, behold His vast complexity, love and beauty. He has given us the capacity to sense deeply when our experience doesn’t match with our hopes or expectations for a reason. It is an invitation to seek God, and He promises that when we do seek Him, we will find Him: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13).

This Easter weekend, as we remember together that Jesus came, was crucified, and defeated death itself to give us life, let’s remember that He designed our souls to be fulfilled and our minds to be at peace by knowing Him deeply. Yes, even us, the prideful, rebellious, power-seekers that we are. He loves us anyway, just the same. He calls us worth dying for, He calls us His, He calls us family. Nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ (Romans 8:39). Rely on the love and sacrifice Jesus made for you today. Seek to know Him more every day; it’s worth it. He is life itself, He is beyond every belief, He is everything. 

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord and whose trust is the Lord. For he will be like a tree planted by the water that extends its roots by a stream and will not fear when heat comes, its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit” (Jeremiah 17:7-8). 

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Dealing with Pride

“what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do” (Romans 7:15). Recently I found myself in a situation where I chose to sin. Of course, this was just one of the many times this has happened. Willfully sinning is really confusing, and more people need to talk about this; it messes with any feelings of pride in myself.    

When I don’t feel right with myself, it’s difficult to keep hold of what’s true. My mind starts to crowd with these lies of how God is disappointed in me, is distant from me, and wants nothing to do with me anymore. How maybe my identity in Him was all just something I made up in my mind. This is really not okay. 

In the midst of this pride-shattering moment, it became quite impossible for me to imagine that He could love me in spite of sin, and yet He does. In fact, He does just the same as if I had never sinned even once. Amazing grace, indeed. So amazing, in fact, that it can be difficult to accept at all.  

Pride

I, like pretty much everybody, sinned against God simply because I wanted to do what I wanted to do. The sin of pride is and can be a wake-up call to look at and watch more carefully what goes on in our hearts and souls. My conscience was firing, my soul needed to get right with God again, and I had to confess my sin. I needed to repent all over again. After wrestling with the fact that I had followed sin instead of God, I realized that I was getting too comfortable. In my pride, my thought was actually that I was close to being past willful sin; but the Bible says that “no one may boast before Him” (1 Corinthians 1:29). 

Even after I repented, I felt it wasn’t enough. I was still upset with myself. God had forgiven me, but I hadn’t been able to forgive myself. Friends, that is pride in a sneaky form. Instead of fully accepting God’s love and forgiveness, I was trying to shoulder the burden of sin myself. In withholding forgiveness for ourselves like I did, we actually think there’s something more we can do to make up for it. In not surrendering fully to God’s forgiveness, we try to take this sin of ours into our own hands. This is pride. 

This is a complicated subject, so don’t mistake my meaning; what we do in our lives–does matter. Sin matters. One of the fruits of the Spirit is love. Jesus said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35). We are certainly meant to live in a way that follows the Way of Jesus, who was sinless. In James, actions are called “works”: “You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2:24). Faith comes first, for actions flow from faith–the fruit of our lives, but what we do and what we choose, matters. However, nothing we do can make up for our sin.    

Sin 

Jesus paid it all for us. It is prideful to try to make up for it in any other way besides how He calls us to–to leave our life of sin. 

Willful sins torture the conscience of those committed to the Way of Jesus. They still can creep up on us, as we are still here on the fallen earth. We still are made of dust. We have one foot here and one readied for the age to come. We have been set free from sin by Jesus, but at any moment we can choose to step outside God’s will to do our own will and sin against Him. 

Sometimes the only way to know what sin is, is because of what the Bible says. My own thoughts and feelings change constantly. My moral compass was shattered at the Fall. It’s hard to know the Truth about many things, and it can appear as though every person has their own version of truth. But actually this cultural catchphrase “live your truth” or “follow your truth” is saying that everyone has their own beliefs about what the truth is. Beliefs do not change the Truth.  

Of course, what we believe is important; for more on that see my post How Belief is Our Most Powerful Tool. But I am saying that believing something doesn’t make it so. 

Hope for self-hate

I debated whether to mention self-hate, but just like willful sin, I feel that it needs to be addressed if we’re talking about a life lived in freedom. Self hate; that point at which I mess up and I’m just disgusted with myself and how miserably I failed to fear God…yep, that was my week. Self-hate is a very real thing and I wanted to share that I experience this because I don’t think I’m the only one. I’m here to say that there is still hope, even in a place of self-hate.

Yes, we sin. But that just gives us another opportunity to talk to God. Another reason to repent, to put our faith in God all over again, and process what went wrong with Him. To let Him make something good grow in us that maybe wasn’t developed yet. Or even to weed out something that no longer needs to be there. He gives us all fresh opportunities to work through our sins with Him, confess them, and let them go thanks to Jesus’ sacrifice. Praise God that “his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning…” (Lamentations 3:22-23). Yes, you will sin, but there is always mercy available to you in Christ Jesus our King. There is hope because “a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ” (Galatians 2:16). Sin no longer has the last word over us, because Christ made a way.  

Where our hearts lie can be seen through the fruit of our lives, but there is nothing you can do to separate you from the love of God (Romans 38:38-39). He longs to be chosen by us. He longs to be allowed into our hearts. He makes all things new (Revelation 12:5). Even sin. Even self-hate. Even the pride we struggle to let go of. 

Humility

God is working on my ego in this, my latest particular experience with sin. Ironically, this is actually something I asked Him to do; I prayed that I wanted my ego to be eliminated, kaput, bye-bye. Be careful what you pray for! I believe that my failed test is helping my prayer to be answered. This experience exposed my pride and revealed beyond a doubt that I am no better than anyone else. That it’s all Him, it’s none of me. No amount of hard work, self-determination, sense of righteousness, or even how close I “felt” to God lately makes me a good person in the slightest. Only God is Good (Mark 10:18; Luke 18:19). None of that stuff can save me or you from sin. Only Jesus can do that, so that no one may boast. Only Jesus. 

Thanks be to God.

If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness (2 Corinthians 11:30).

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world (Galatians 6:14). 

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Royal Identity

Happy 2020! I’m so excited to finally dive into the topic of identity. Understanding my identity and identity as God defines it changed everything for me in 2015. Identity was the key to regaining faith in God after I had lost every last drop of it. I used to define myself in all kinds of ways–by how good I was at my job, how I saw myself, how others saw me, what I knew and the kinds of questions I asked, the places I’d been . . . you get the idea. I’d also “try on” new identities when I found them to see if they’d fit. Nothing ever satisfied for long. It wasn’t until I realized I didn’t actually understand God or who He really is or the truth about why He made humans to begin with. Once I discovered that for myself in my own time, my identity became much more clear. Did you know that royalty is in our blood? (Genesis 1:26, 1:28). I certainly didn’t. But it’s True!

God made humans to rule the Earth. 

We all have a deep-seated desire to rule, to bring order, to make something out of the world and our place in it. That’s not by accident. In John Mark Comer’s book Garden City, he unpacks this idea that we were always meant to reign, to work, make culture, build cities, and help people and animals thrive. We are actually designed as rulers of the Earth–we are kings and queens by birth. 

We were never meant to die or leave this Earth but instead to rule it, reign over it, and enjoy it. Comer writes that it’s in our blood to desire greatness, because that’s who we really are. We descend from kings and queens, and we are designed to be kings and queens. How often do we live like we believe that?

You don’t have to strive to become somebody because you already ARE somebody. 

Awareness of my sin blinded me to this identity for myself, and sometimes still does. I used to believe that if God was real, He had made me a sinner. From a very young age I recognized the pain I caused to myself and others and resented it and myself for it. In other words, I believed it was God’s fault that I was born “bad,” so why would I want to try to be anything better than I was? Shouldn’t I just embrace who I am, push others to do the same, and leave it at that? After all, that’s what Western culture fights for and tells us we should fight for too. Why would I want or need forgiveness from God like Christianity teaches if I couldn’t help but to be “bad” in the first place? Seemed pretty unfair to me. How could a good God send anyone to hell if He set us up to fail by making us sinful? But that’s a lie I believed. The truth is that God made us to rule. 

Discovering and knowing that God didn’t set us up to fail was everything for me. 

I knew there was a disconnect in holding this belief but no answers made sense to me for years. Eventually I asked the question, “Do I really know who God is?” The answer was a resounding no. Instead of a God of mixed and confusing messages, I slowly came to know God as the Creator of a beautiful Earth and the Creator of humans to rule over it, take care of it, and thrive. I came to know God as a loving, holy Father who always intended the best for us, and who created us good, in His Good image, to represent Him on Earth. I came to know God as the good, loving, merciful, faithful, sacrificial, kind, and patient God He is. Understanding Him not as the condemner to hell but as the Savior of souls that have wandered away from God’s design, longing for rest and peace. Instead of focusing on what confusion my pain caused, my thinking started to transform when focusing on the loving heart of God and His original intentions for us. 

Knowing God’s love, all the pain, sin, and shame of my past just doesn’t matter anymore.

I mean, it still really sucks that we can’t rule as God originally designed. While royalty is in our DNA, sin crept into our hearts at the Fall and has been around ever since. In other words, we messed up our chance to rule the world as our natures predispose us to do. Instead, we were given a second chance by God in the form of a choice. That’s where the best news comes in.  God allows us to choose whether or not to submit to His authority to get back to His design. Jesus, God in the flesh, took on our sin by His amazing grace and He now rules the Earth in our place, because we could not. Now, we must let God take care of the world. We can no longer rule the Earth on our own because sin entered into the world and our egos twisted the desire to rule for common good into the desire to rule for personal glory. But we may reign with Jesus over the Earth for all eternity as God’s design intended. All He asks is to trust in Him. 

The end of the story is hopeful! Nothing could ever stop God’s design, it will come about regardless of human decisions. But God gives us the chance to reenter His design through believing in Jesus’ sacrifice covering the debt of sin we are responsible for. God in the flesh, Jesus, came to save our souls from separation from God. He fulfilled the human’s purpose to rule the world where Adam and Eve could not rule. 

We are kings and queens because the King of all made it so. Not because of anything we’ve done, not because we deserved it, but because of the grace of the one True King. 

Sometimes it takes hitting a low point like I did to realize there’s more to life than being born, working, maybe marrying or procreating, and definitely dying. There’s not only pain. Love is here. No amount of sin could wipe it out. Love is the reason you are here, and God doesn’t leave you alone in the mess of pain and suffering. He loved us so much He was willing to do anything to get us out of the mess and cycle of destruction we inherited from our ancestors, the human kings and queens of old. He doesn’t just show us kindness once in a while, when things in life seem to be going well, He doesn’t only think about us when we think about Him or pray to Him. He is kind and good to us all the time. He thinks about us always, wanting the best for us. Jesus provided the Way for us to get out of the mess of sin that distracts, destroys, and deceives us and allows us to live in the peace and joy of knowing Him and following His Way, his plan for your identity. 

We were not made to suffer and die. We were made to rule. 

You have purpose. You have value. You ARE somebody. You are precious, valued, and loved beyond what you or I or any human being can comprehend. 

The King of kings has given us an identity, a name, a purpose that no doubt or sin can ever erase. 

May we live as the kings and queens God made us to be, now and for eternity. 

Further suggested reading: Garden City by John Mark Comer

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Repentance

Turning back to God didn’t happen just once for the Israelites, and it certainly didn’t happen just once for me. In my own life, I’ve turned back to Him more times than I can count, sometimes multiple times in a day. However, one time in particular was the start of a big change in my life. Admitting we are wrong isn’t easy. Yet in a sense, it is exactly what repentance, and in fact Christianity, calls for.  

When I discovered this, I didn’t like it at all. It made so much more sense to me that I was fine just the way I was. That sin wasn’t a big deal to be ashamed of but something we learn to cope with. That I wouldn’t really be held responsible for sin, especially the inherited kind that I had no control over. Following this logic, it was easy to lose ground with faith, and I slipped further and further away from the truth of what God’s Word actually says about sin. After losing my faith entirely, living my own way, and believing these “comfortable” things for several years, repentance from sin as the Bible describes it finally became real to me.  

One of my favorite verses in Scripture now is Romans 2:4, “...God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance.” While I was fully convinced of the merits of not believing in sin or God, He reached into my life and showed kindness so undeniable that I couldn’t ignore it or explain it away. When I realized that it really was God’s kindness, not some happy accident or coincidence, it changed something in my heart.

On the path of losing my faith, my heart had gone through a number of phases toward God; I became skeptical, then callous, then arrogant, cold, and unloving. I had been awful to God if He truly was real. I had denied Him. Yet, even still, God showed me kindness. Despite how awful I was to Him, His kindness was the only thing that finally warmed my cold heart. Only a few months later I truly wanted to repent, to turn everything in my life around and trust God instead. It all started with His kindness. His kindness led me off the path of faithlessness and onto a new path of true repentance.

God’s kindness can reach beyond all intellectual and emotional barriers. 

The call to repent really intensified shortly before Jesus’ three years of ministry when John the Baptist began preaching, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near” (Matthew 3:2). After John was put into prison, Jesus moved to Capernaum and “From that time on Jesus began to preach, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near’” (Matthew 4:17). These two major figures of the Bible both had the same core message! So, what is so important about repentance?  

Repentance comes up quite a bit in Scripture. It is associated with baptism and life. In trying to Biblically define repentance, I found that it is to allow oneself to be corrected (Jeremiah 5:3, Revelation 2:21), to realize and turn from wickedness (Jeremiah 8:6), to turn from idols and renounce all detestable practices (Ezekiel 14:6), to turn away from all our offenses (Ezekiel 18:30), to (re)turn to God (1 Samuel 7:2b-3, Hosea 14:1, Acts 3:19, Acts 26:20), and to produce [spiritual] fruit (Matthew 3:8, Luke 3:8); it involves faith in God (Matthew 21:32, Mark 1:15, Acts 20:21), it is a command to all people everywhere (Acts 17:30), it involves Godly sorrow (2 Corinthians 7:9-10), it involves and is done in relation to sin (John 1:28, 2 Corinthians 12:21), it involves recognition of the truth (2 Timothy 2:25), it is something God wants for everyone (2 Peter 3:9), it is a sort of waking up (Revelation 3:3), and it can result from God’s love, discipline, rebuke (Revelation 3:19), and kindness (Romans 2:4). 

God wants nothing more than for us all to repent. When we do, it unlocks our hearts to be open to receive His promises, His gifts of the Spirit, and His presence. He longs to be close to us. When I chose to keep Him away in my own life, I fell into the sin of idolatry, among others. God’s very first commandment to the Isrealites is to have no other gods before [Him] (Exodus 20:3). While I don’t recall having any golden statues in my house to worship, for me, idolatry came in the form of putting other things before God. The prophet Samuel spoke to the Isrealites about this;

“Then all the people of Israel turned back to the Lord. So Samuel said to all the Israelites, ‘If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines’” (1 Samuel 7:2b-3).

This Old Testament passage speaks not only of repentance but idolatry, of putting other gods in place of the one true living God. He wants nothing to come between Him and any one of us. He wants our hearts to be committed to Him. 

I had gotten lost in the prevalent explanations that society offers: we all make our own truth, there is no one absolute truth, all you need to do is be a good person, you don’t need to feel ashamed of anything about yourself, there are no eternal consequences for anything, and there is nothing after we die. 

These lies became idols in my life. 

I had adopted them and they became louder in my mind than God’s still, small voice. I was trying to live out this new philosophy of life where I had landed, but I was still miserable. I was even more miserable than I had been when I wasn’t sure of whether or not God was real. It was all too much and I just became numb. It was a dark, confusing, and exhausting time. If you know someone going through a time like this, please check out my post, “10 Ways to Help Someone Struggling with Faith.” Friends, it is so easy to latch onto lies the world tells us; they usually sound good and fair on the surface. However, we must test everything against the truth in the Word of God. It points us back to the truth about ourselves, and to Jesus, who is our hope. 

God keeps His promises. He promised salvation, and He keeps that promise through Jesus and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. 

Repentance leads to receiving God’s promise of deliverance from sin through Jesus Christ.  

God reached out to me even when my mind and heart were closed to Him, when the misery became too much to bear. It was wonderful, amazing grace. This miracle still astounds me. I finally knew without a doubt that God is real, but I couldn’t go back to all the same beliefs I had about God before. Some of those beliefs still needed to be changed, because they weren’t all true. Even though I had repented, I still had to rethink everything all over again. All I knew was that He is real; I had to just start there. I had lied to myself for so long it was hard to know the truth, but I craved it. The fact that I knew He was real meant I couldn’t trust atheist or agnostic sources anymore. He led me right back to the Bible for answers, a Book that I hadn’t trusted in a long time. But I trusted that God was real, so I gave it another chance.

It was a process to understand sin, and how it had cut me off from relationship with God, and that I had gone my own way because of it. I had repented, but then later after seeking truth I finally understood. “‘After I strayed, I repented; after I came to understand, I beat my breast. I was ashamed and humiliated because I bore the disgrace of my youth’” (Jeremiah 31:19). We need both repentance and understanding to sustain us in our faith. I had to come to face the worst of it which was finally clear to me; I’d KNOWN God and STILL walked away from Him! Maybe some of you can relate to this story. Even still, all God asks is for us to trust Him enough to repent. Through repentance–turning from sin and relying on the salvation Jesus offers each one of us–He promises us restoration back to Himself.   

I pray that you can learn from my mistake: you don’t have to walk away from God like I did for your faith to be renewed and strengthened! By seeking Him and the truth about Him, you can know He is real now, you can know He loves you now, you can know His intentions for you were always good. “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13). Yes, sin crept into humanity at the start and bad things happen. Being a good person isn’t enough to conquer sin and death; only Jesus can do that for us. With repentance comes restoration. “Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘If you repent, I will restore you that you may serve me; if you utter worthy, not worthless, words, you will be my spokesman. Let this people turn to you, but you must not turn to them’” (Jeremiah 15:19). There is always hope.

God longs to restore us to walk with Him as He originally intended in the Garden.

Yes, true repentance will cost everything in your life. To fully trust God and walk in repentance, we must let our own logic about what is right for us die and surrender our lives to His way, “Then [Jesus] said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). The cost is great, but it’s well worth it. God’s way is better than anything we could dream up for ourselves. I’ve never met a single Christian who was sorry they made the choice to follow Jesus.

When repentance and understanding came, the nagging sense of meaninglessness and numbness in my life disappeared. I accepted the truth the Word offers about my own sin, that it is in fact a barrier to relationship with God. Jesus brought justice where I didn’t deserve justice. He loved me when I didn’t love Him. He made a way for me even after I closed the door of my heart to Him. 

No one is too far from His love to be found by Him. 

After I repented and accepted Jesus’ gift of life for me, I couldn’t just go on as I had been going. My life dramatically changed. I started attending church again. I made Christian friends and sought their counsel. I prayed as much as I could because prayer had been restored to me, right along with my life. I had a reason to live again, and to glorify Him in everything. I’m sure my family would tell you I cried less tears.

Change is evidence of true repentance. 

I am still learning and definitely still do things that are wrong. I still need to repent of those things. However, everything changed when I repented of the way I was living and believing. At that moment, change really began. My faith in God is now growing all the time where before it was dead. God restored my ruined life and handed it back to me miraculously whole again. 

Eternal life begins now when we repent, we don’t have to wait until after we die to begin living it! Jesus has truly restored all things, including a life where I can find joy despite the pain this life can bring. It all starts with repentance. May we all be quick to repent and turn to the Lord.

“‘This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says: ‘In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength…” (Isaiah 30:15a)

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