Recently, I've noticed a restlessness in my spirit when I say it, a feeling of discomfort, one in which I can't quite identify the source. This feeling isn't new and is one I often feel when the Holy Spirit is moving me to tackle a stronghold that, once removed, will take me to a deeper level in my relationship with Christ. I felt this stirring a few years ago when I entered into my 7 experience, and God opened my eyes to see service to Him in a whole new light. It's not a feeling I relish because it leads to some uncomfortable soul-searching, but it's that discomfort that draws me nearer and pushes me closer. It's not like I can run from God. Sooner or later, He catches my attention and praise God. It's evidence of His spirit working in me, not leaving me where I am but making me a new creation. This time, I believe what He's asking is, "Do you believe Me? When you share that truth with your children, do you believe and claim it for yourself?" Oh, Father, I want to, with everything in me, I want to.
Basking in the glow of God's love is something I've struggled with my entire Christian walk. Understanding why I'm afraid will require the skill of an archaeologist, but this post is my attempt to unearth the reasons and move forward. Much of my early church experience painted a picture of God that was stern, impossible to please, and full of wrath, and while this may not be an accurate representation of what I was taught, it's what I remember. If scaring me into obedience was the goal of my minister, he succeeded. Though, intellectually, now, I know it's not true, it's hard to overcome years of mastering the art of fear. Not reverence or awe but fear of a capricious God who relishes in preparing for judgment day when He can cast all sinners into the eternal fire. It's difficult to run with abandon like a child into the arms of that image of God no matter how desperately you might try. While this isn't the picture my parents painted of God, it's the one I held to. I understood that He was just, righteous, and to be feared. The terror of the end times? I knew more about eschatology than most scholars. Mention the shepherd who gently leads me, and you'd receive a blank stare.Faith became less about falling in love with my Creator and more about pleasing Him because somehow I thought that was possible. If I did a, b, and c, He'd surely love me. The frightening thing is I felt safe with this setup. I knew the "rules"; I followed the "rules." I knew the game and how to score the most points. I'm sure I was a moralistic, self-righteous bundle of joy most of the time. But, it was a concise plan that required no emotional investment. The trouble is it left me lost. It isn't that I didn't realize I was a depraved sinner in need of grace, it's that I believed that grace applied to everyone but me. I had convinced myself that, though God and His love were real, that somehow I didn't qualify. Every time I attempted to jump into His arms with abandon, the bungee cord of "not good enough" or "follow the rules" or "he couldn't possibly love you" would cruelly snap me back into my safety net. As difficult as it was to admit, I doubted God's love for me. I had somehow convinced myself, though, that doubt was an unacceptable component of faith.
So, I was a doubt-guilt-ridden moralist who was afraid to love God and afraid to believe that He really loved me. Recently, I read in a Beth Moore study on Thessalonians that when we are "down to the dregs, we often grip tighter to what we have left: our legalism." This was true of me. I wasn't allowing myself to be loved by God, which affected every aspect of my faith, so I clung to my legalism. It was a season of rebellion in college that actually taught me about grace. One of the darkest moments in my faith journey actually became the most enlightening, shining a spotlight on who God really is, not what I perceived Him to be through inaccurately taught theology. I began to understand that slipping up was inevitable because the law was impossible to follow. I had become such a broken fragile mess that I didn't recognize the person staring back at me in the mirror. Yet, it was the first time I really understood my need for God, my desperate dependence on His mercy and grace. That began a journey of transformation for me. More recently, I also decided to read the bible from cover to cover with the prayer that God would reveal Himself to me. Here's what I've been learning.
Doubt is not the opposite of faith.
I read recently that doubt is not the opposite of faith; fear is the opposite of faith. My minister has often said, "Doubt is the ants in the pants of faith." I take this to mean that doubt is the itch that drives us further in to our faith. My doubting God's love for me left me hollow, and for a time, I sought to fill that space with what the world had to offer, but it was eventually my doubt that led me to a deeper faith. I often berated myself for doubting God's love, which would lead to a stricter following of the "rules." I'm finally seeing that rather than pretending like my doubt doesn't exist that it's okay to wrestle through it. I've discovered in this particular journey that great men and women of faith have struggled with different kinds of doubt. John Wesley struggled with understanding God as father, writing in his journal, "I had even the faith of a servant, though not that of a son." David struggled with doubt when he wrote in Psalm 77, "Will the Lord reject forever, and never again show favor? Has his faithful love ceased forever? ...Has He in anger withheld His compassion?" John the Baptist in prison asked Jesus, "Are you the one?" after baptizing Him and hearing the Lord proclaim, "This is my beloved." Thomas earned the nickname Doubting Thomas when he proclaimed, "unless I see the scars on His hands." Mother Theresa struggled mightily with doubt. The more I study the giants of our Christian faith, the more I find that doubt is a normal part of the faith journey. For those of us who are believers, though, doubts scare us, whether we doubt God's love or our future or wonder if He's forsaken us, as Jesus when He shouted from the cross, "My Lord, My Lord, why have you forsaken me?" We wonder if doubt is the same as unbelief, if somehow we're not saved if we have doubts, but, I find it's my doubt that drives me to Him, where I seek God desperately and am reminded that those who seek Him shall find Him. Doubt is strengthening my faith because I no longer take everything for granted, I no longer desire to live complacently, and I actively seek to understand what it means to live freely in the grace of Christ.
We have an enemy of our soul.
I realize any discussion of Satan makes some believers uncomfortable, but I'm learning that understanding that we have an enemy who wants nothing more than to make us believe that God doesn't love us or isn't for us or has abandoned us. Ephesians 6:12 says, "For our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world powers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavens," and 1 Peter 5:8 reminds us that "our adversary the Devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour." Our enemy wants us to think that God is the bad guy, that He doesn't really love us. If the devil can have me so wrapped up in wondering whether I am a beloved child of God or not then He renders me ineffective. There's power in believing that the Creator of the universe loves you with abandon, power that can defeat the lies of the enemy. Understanding the reality of spiritual warfare, I believe, helps me to understand that while God is for me, there are powers that are against me. If Satan can convince me I'm unlovable and unworthy then I'm not serving God in the confidence of being His beloved. My energy is focused inward, not outward sharing the Gospel and meeting the needs of others. Pride, fueled by the father of deceit, lies at the heart of my doubt. It's a matter of pride and self-focus to think God could love everyone but me, and it's exactly what the enemy wants me to believe.
Jesus proves God's love.
I recently discovered a verse that is changing my life. Hebrews 1:3 tells us that "Christ is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact image of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." Jesus, being in the very nature God, loves me. Though, I've struggled with understanding God's love and often sit under the false cloud of self-condemnation that I believe is His displeasure with me, which by the way is a horrible, haunting mental place to be, I've always understood Christ's love. Jesus, I love. Jesus who lovingly washed the feet of his disciples. Jesus, who fed the crowds. Jesus, the gentle shepherd who leaves the 99 to retrieve the one lost, Jesus who didn't condemn the woman caught in adultery, who didn't scold the woman who literally poured everything she had and bore her soul at the feet of her Savior, washing his feet with her hair. Jesus, moved to compassion. Jesus, who welcomes the prodigal home with open arms and no questions. Jesus, giver of wild, unfathomable grace. This Jesus is the exact image of the nature of God. God, not only revealed His love and nature through creation where He walked with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day, He revealed His love in Christ, the ultimate revelation of His love. Jesus, perfect, unblemished, who didn't just die on the cross but who also withstood being forsaken by His father and took on the entire wrath of God, paying the penalty for every sin that had been committed and would be committed. It doesn't stop there. He not only actively prays for us, sitting at the right hand of the Father interceding for us, He also sent the Holy Spirit to guide and comfort us. How could I ever doubt the love of God?
As I begin to grasp and cling to this truth, I find myself reading the whole of scripture through new eyes. I admit there are Old Testament passages that cause me to bristle, but from the beginning, God sought to provide a way back. We sinned, we breached the contract, and ever since that first moment of rebellion, God has set into motion a plan to set things right. God, who revealed His nature of grace and mercy, through Christ loves me. I wonder if I've subconsciously fought this truth because I knew when I finally grasped how high, how deep, how vast the love of God is that it would change my life. Change is scary, transformation is uncomfortable. Laws and rules are comfortable, grace is free, yet there's something inherently threatening to a legalist like me about freedom. But it's impossible to know that God loves me, truly loves me, and isn't content with leaving me in my doubt, but moves heaven and earth to seek and save the lost, it's impossible to realize that and not be transformed. He was willing to leave the majesty of heaven and come to earth to rescue me. When I find it difficult to consider that the Creator of the universe truly loves me, I simply look at the cross and consider what Jesus was willing to sacrifice for me. That is truth that transforms and love that proves without a doubt that I am indeed His beloved. No matter what my untrustworthy emotions try to convince me to believe, the truth that He loves me is unchanging. And it's a truth that I can no longer keep to myself.
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