3/24/10
His love for me didn't change did it?
Just because Im saved doesn't mean I now have to earn it.
It simply means Im free.
He never identified me with the sin, he only saw me.
He doesn't identify me with my sin, he only sees me.
He only sees me.
The one that he loves.
I am the one that he loves.
Its not "now you're saved, repay me"
Its "now you're saved, you're free"
When I wasn't saved, I couldn't be with him.
Now that I'm saved, I can be with him.
Nothing else changes, except that I'm free.
I should tell people about this amazing freedom!
I should help people walk in a fuller freedom than they know now.
I can help teach and guide them, as others teach and guide me.
It's not my job, it's my desire.
It's not your job, Emilie. It's not your requirement. It's what you'll want to do. He just made your direction clear. Now that you know, go tell others. Spread the word of this Wonder! I was Lost and now Im Found! I was Blind but now I See! I was Dead but now I am Alive! I was a Prisoner but now I am Free!
How easy, to tell such good news! It's not my job, it's my pleasure!
There is no one who can save like Jesus can.
There is no better way to live!
How amazing is this grace, unearned and undeserved. Never to be tried to pay back.
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From the Book
"What's So Amazing About Grace"
By Philip Yancey
Sin:"The bible's many fierce passages on sin appear in a new light once I understand God's desire to press me toward repentance, the doorway to grace. Jesus told Nicodemus, 'For God did not send his son in to thebworld to Condemn the world, but to save the world through him.' In other words, he awakes guilt for my own benefit. God seeks not to crush but to liberate me. 'It is the saints who have a sense of sin,' as Father Danielou says, 'The sense of sin is the measure of a soul's awareness of God.'"
***
"The opposite of sin is grace, not virtue"
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"One who has been touched by grace will no longer look on those who stray as 'those evil people' or 'those poor people who need our help.' Nor must we search for signs of 'loveworthiness.' Grace teaches us that God loves because of who God is, not because of who we are.
"Categories of worthiness do not apply. In his autobiography, the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche told of his ability to 'smell' the inmost parts of every soul, especially the 'abundant hidden dirt at the bottom of many a character.' Nietzsche was a master of ungrace. We are called to do the opposite, to smell the residue of hidden worth.
"In a scene from the movie Ironweed, the characters played by Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep stumble across and old Eskimo woman lying in the snow, probably drunk. Besotted themselves, the two debate what they should do about her.
"Is she drunk or a bum?" Asks Nickolson
"Just a bum. Been one all her life."
"And before that?"
"She was a whore in Alaska."
"She hasn't been a whore all her life. Before that?"
"I dunno. Just a little kid, I guess."
"Well a little kid's something. It's not a bum and it's not a whore. It's something. Let's take her in."
"The two vagrants were seeing the Eskimo woman through the lens of grace. Where society saw only a bum and a whore, grace saw 'a little kid' a person made in the image of God no matter how defaced that image had become."
***
I marvel at Jesus' tenderness in dealing with people.
John gives the account of Jesus' impromptu conversation with a woman at a well.
In those days the husband initiated the divorce: this samaritan woman had been dumped by five different men
Jesus could have begun by pointing out what a mess the woman had made of her life.
Yes he did not say, "young woman, do you realize what an immoral thin you're doing, living with a man who is not your husband?"
Rather he said, in effect, I sense you are very thirsty.
Jesus went on to tell her that the water she was drinking would never satisfy
and then offered her living water to quench her thirst forever.
I try to recall this spirit of Jesus when I encounter someone of who I morally disapprove.
This must be a very thirsty person, I tell myself.
I once talked with the priest Henri Nouwen just after he had returned from San Francisco.
He had visited various ministries to AIDS victims and was moved with compassion by their sad stories.
"They want love so bad, it's literally killing them," he said.
He saw them as thirsty people panting after the wrong kind of water.
When I am tempted to recoil in horror from sinners, from "different" people, I remember what it must have been like for Jesus to live on earth.
Perfect...sinless...
Jesus had every right to be repulsed by the behavior of those around him.
YET, he treated notorious sinners with mercy and not judgement.
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I don't want to resign myself to the idea that God loves me simply because he said so.
Show me.
I don't want to believe that God loves me simply because someone told me he does.
Show me.
Do you love me?
Yes-
Show me.
I don't want to just trust it, I want to know it.
You say that it is this way.
Show me.
I don't want to always be beating back my true feelings and following my mind.
RESIGN myself to knowledge. SETTLE for the story.
The old testament is not the New Testament.
The relationship then is different than what it can be now.
Show me.
I want to see it. I want to feel it. I WANT IT TO BE A REAL RELATIONSHIP!
I don't want to be given a picture and be told, "Don't worry, this person loves you. See! They sent you a card."
Can't He come see me himself? Cant He show me his love and care in person?
Sometimes he goes no trip, so I remember his love and wait for his return. But for one that has left and not come back….how do you stay faithful? With no card, with no calls, with no care?
To just trust it?
What happens when it becomes just words with no action?
Do you love me?
---no answer
Does he love me?
---yes he does, they say
How do I know?
---he wrote it down
---he told you before
Where is he now?…What happens now? Do I just settle with a stale remembrance of the past?…I guess that is enough…but does it really have to be that way?
Is this really as hard as its supposed to be?
Can I ask to be shown? Or do I quiet my restless heart and keep chugging away, chanting in the back of my mind the mantra that keeps me going….he loves me, he loves me, he loves me.
Do I ask too much when I want to be shown again?….I would tell others, of course not! It would be understandable if a wife were neglected, it wouldn't matter what he said, or what had done in the past, love is a daily thing. Does she have to do something in order to be shown that love? (i.e. she can only feel neglected if she puts into it, and he doesn't reciprocate. If she doesn't put into it, she can't blame him for being so distant….but is it really her move first? Was it ever her move first?)
Christ moved first. Does he still move first when you're saved, or is it your turn?
Our relationships with people effect how we view God. Word for word these ideas were developed from my past relationships….the unhealthy ones. It is interesting. I know in my mind and in my heart that they were unhealthy. That they were unfair to me. But for the life of me, I can't shake the principles that caused me to act the way that I did. That deep belief that I was to act in a way that facilitated an unhealthy relationship.
Which came first, though. Was it the human relationships that developed the principles that I put on to God? Or was it my principles with God which I use with people?
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