Dark But Lovely

So I’m really enjoying my Sermon on the Mount class. It’s basically calling us to radical obedience and every week I want to go after it a little bit harder. But this class has been transformational for me. So I’ve thought that in order to walk out this Christianity thing I had to “be good” and “be perfect.” Turns out that’s not what it’s about. The class is all about pursuing 100 fold obedience, which basically means seeking to obey God in every area of your life. Here’s the kicker… it’s all about PURSUING… it’s not all about attaining. If we seek to attain it, we’re never going to succeed. We can’t without Jesus. It’s not possible. We are going to fail and guess what? It’s ok. So this whole time I’ve felt weak and like I’m behind everybody else right? Well it turns out that’s where I’m supposed to be. God knows we’re going to fail. It’s what we do when we fail that matters. When we fall we’re supposed to get up, repent for our sin, then turn around and receive His forgiveness and start running after Him and set our heart not to sin. We re going to because we’re human. But as long as we’re setting our heart to obey, God sees the yes and He says well done my good and faithful servant. I’m reading this book about spiritual gifts and tonight I came across this passage and I’m not really sure why it was in the book but I know that God used it to speak to my heart. In Proverbs there’s a verse that says the righteous man will fall 7 times but God will pick him up 8. He’s always going to pick us up! He’s never going to let us fail and then just leave us there. About a month before I came here we brought the Mercy Street youth up here and so one day I was sitting in the prayer room and this girl sang this song that was God speaking right to my heart and she said I’m not in a rush I’m not in a hurry. I’m a lover of the process and a lover of the journey. Stop comparing yourself to others. You are exactly where you need to be. Our teacher gave a really good picture of how God looks at us. He said imagine you are a little baby and you are just learning to walk. When you fall down does your father go what is the matter with you? Haven’t you got it right yet? I’m so frustrated with you and disappointed in you. That would be crazy right? But that’s how we view God. That every time we fail God is standing there mad and ready to lay into us for getting it wrong. But that’s not how He is at all . He’s looking at us in our weakness and immaturity because He sees us through the blood of Jesus and we are now His righteousness and he sees every tiny step we take toward Him and He sees every tiny yes we say in our hearts and He is standing there with His arms wide open encouraging us and calling us closer to him. So we’re to look at ourselves as babies just learning to walk and talk. This I can definitely do because that’s how I feel anyway. And then Sada gave the picture of when the girl is saying draw me away and we will run together, it says together. God is not sadistically running ahead of you like a drill sergeant telling you to speed up and get it right. He’s in front of you, but running at your pace, and encouraging you the whole time, not condemning you for not getting it right. So it’s been a totally different way of looking at things for me. The first part of the beatitudes is blessed are the poor in spirit. Poor in spirit basically means you see your need for Jesus. You see that you are a horrible sinful dark person and you can not do this thing on your own. So before I got here I was like I can do this Christianity thing. I’m not that bad and I don’t really have a lot of sin. I can do this thing. Turns out there’s a little bit of pride in there too, which of course happens to be sin. When in actuality, I know that if I face my true darkness I'm going to feel like God doesn't like me so I just pretend like it's not there so God likes me. Haha enter God. Ever since I got here I feel like God has been revealing more and more of my darkness. The teachers all keep saying that the more light and truth that comes into you, the more your darkness is going to surface. So it’s a good thing but man oh man is it ugly! He had started before I left but nothing like this. God has shed light on so many areas of darkness inside me it’s ridiculous. The thing is it’s mostly in my thoughts and my speech so I didn’t perceive it as sin. I just thought that’s how everyone was. Nope, there is no question in my mind that it is sin and not only do I struggle with it, but I am consumed by it. I have seen that there is no way that I can pursue righteousness and holiness in my own strength. I am weak and in desperate need of a Savior. Enter Jesus! The Excellencies of Christ class has been amazing too because it points everything back to Jesus dying on the cross. I just love the way that God has orchestrated everything about fire in the night so nicely. Almost like He knew what He was doing or something! So this past month or so I’ve really been struggling with the dark but lovely concept. Now I see the darkness in my heart and everything in me wants to run and hide from God so that He doesn’t see who I really am. Funny thing is, He already knows and in my darkness He says He loves me and I’m lovely. Our Song of Solomon class this week was about the dark but lovely part. Sada explained the part where she calls herself the lily of the valley. Lilies are really tall but they have a very weak stem so basically she’s saying God I’m so weak! I’m so prone to wander and I’m so sinful. And God goes like a lily among thorns is my beloved. Here He’s basically saying, in the midst of your weakness, I see your weak love, it’s real, and I hear your weak cry to be mine wholeheartedly and I see you like a beautiful flower amidst the darkness and sinfulness of the rest of this world. He sees the desire to obey him even in our weakness! So as she’s explaining this, God goes Amy you are like a butterfly among a dead forest. So the first time Andrew took me out on the four wheeler we went through all this gross dead forest area and as we were driving around I was just struck with how ugly and dead everything looked. And then out of nowhere I saw this beautiful butterfly fly by and I was struck with how beautiful it was amidst the ugly forest. And I remember as I was watching it God goes, that’s how I see you Amy. How appropriate that He used a butterfly! Does He know me or what? So God has really been opening up my eyes in little ways to how He feels about me and to His true character. He’s not frustrated with me. He’s kind and good and most of all I need to see Him as patient! There have been a lot of people in my life who haven’t been. It’s been really good too because the other day one of my teachers said that God will never condemn you. So if you have a condemning thought, it didn’t come from Him. Before I left and since I have been here I have had this reoccurring thought. So I had to give up the people and things that I love the most to come here and I thought it was punishment. God told me that I had made them into idols and now he had to punish me by taking them away from me. So I have been here the whole time trying to ask for forgiveness for making these things into idols and putting them above God. So on Saturday night Corey’s set was amazing. If you can go back and listen to it, do. It was 9-11pm and 10-11 was the best. Anyway they were singing and I can’t even remember for sure how I got here but I think there was a part where they were singing about how God sees and God knows. For whatever reason I got stuck on the God knows. So as I’m sitting there singing, my thoughts wander to God you know. You know that from the beginning I have set it in my heart not to make these people and things idols and I’ve asked you to help me. From the beginning I’ve said none of it matters if I don’t have You first and foremost and if I don’t know how You feel about me. And again it was just like truth exploding in my heart. He goes I do know. I see your desire to put me first and I would never punish you for being weak. I am a good father and I like to give good gifts. You have dove’s eyes and you’ve never taken them off me no matter what gift I have given you. So this whole time I have been condemning myself for something that wasn’t even true! Stupid devil! So then on Monday I was skipping ahead in the Song of Solomon notes and at the very end of the dark but lovely section it talks about Peter. Peter is the one who denied Jesus 3 times even though he said there was no way he would. So the notes are talking about after Jesus is resurrected and He comes to Peter and he’s asking him Peter do you love me? He says it 3 times and finally Peter goes Jesus you know all things of course you know I love you! The next part was really interesting. Obviously Jesus didn’t need Peter to tell him he loved him. He knew Peter did but He wanted Peter to have confidence in his sincere love for Jesus. What he needed was for Peter to know that even in the midst of weakness and failure that Peter really did love Jesus. The notes do a better job than my paraphrasing so here they are. God was basically saying Peter you do love me. In the garden 8 days ago I told you that you had weak flesh and a willing spirit. You didn’t believe your flesh was weak. You need to understand that you do have a willing spirit. You do have a yes in your spirit toward me. I saw it in you before you stumbled. When I see you I don’t only see your weak flesh, I also see your sincere love for me. So as I was reading that the sentence “you didn’t believe your flesh was weak” really screamed out at me. That’s my problem and why I’ve thought I can do this on my own. I don’t believe that my flesh is weak. And then a thought occurred to me. I don’t know if it was revelation or just a thought, but I thought ok so I know that there’s a part in Song of Solomon where He asks her to give up everything she loves because He wants to see if she’ll still love Him when He removes the gifts and ministry He’s given her. But then it occurred to me. What if in the same way Peter needed to know that he still loved Jesus, God had me give up everything because I needed to know that those things were not idols and that I really will still love him now matter what. Anyway, just food for thought. Praise be to God that He is opening my eyes to the truth. And even though I’m dark, He’s beginning to open my eyes to the truth that to Him, I’m still lovely. He loves me in the midst of weakness. I don’t have to try to be good. I can’t do it. The only good in me comes from him and the Holy Spirit is the only one who can help me. Oh how relieving it is to know that I’m not alone. He’s not punishing me. He’ll never abandon me or forsake me. He's patient with me!!! Everything He is doing is out of love. Please pray for more revelation of the truth to illuminate my darkness =)

P.S. God told me to be as vulnerable as possible in these blogs which you know I hate so I hope I’m doing a good job at it.