There’s Only Grace

It’s time for healing, time to move on
It’s time to fix what’s been broken too long
Time make right what has been wrong
It’s time to find my way to where I belong
There’s a wave that’s crashing over me
And all I can do is surrender

(Chorus)
Whatever You’re doing inside of me
It feels like chaos but somehow there’s peace
It’s hard to surrender to what I can’t see
but I’m giving in to something Heavenly
~Sanctus Real

2008 is almost over. It’s been a year of intense change, growth and learning, lots of tears, and some amazing memories.

This year has brought, more than anything, questions. Questions about people and how we relate to each other, questions about trust and the quest for truth, and questions about God. His character, his plan for my life, and his desire for my heart.

All of those questions have been running rampant through my mind for the last twelve months, and slowly, they’re starting to be answered. I’m not by any means saying that I have all the answers, because nothing could be further from the truth. But I am learning more every day, through every conversation I have and every book I read.

One thing I have really struggled with this year is, “Why does God let bad things happen, and why doesn’t he step in and change it once it all falls apart?” This has been a hard one. Anyone who has spent any significant amount of time with me this year knows why it has been so intense, and why this concept has been so difficult for me to come to terms with. It would seem that if God really is all powerful and loving, he would turn bad situations around immediately. He could have jumped in and turned everything around in a split second, but he didn’t. There’s a Casting Crowns song that addresses this very question:

“I was sure by now, God You would have reached down
and wiped our tears away, stepped in and saved the day.
But once again, I say ‘Amen’ and it’s still raining.
As the thunder rolls I barely hear You whisper through the rain,
“I’m with you.”
And as Your mercy falls
I raise my hands and praise the God who gives and takes away.

And I’ll praise you in this storm and I will lift my hands
For You are who You are no matter where I am
And every tear I’ve cried You hold in your hand
You never left my side and though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm”
~Casting Crowns

Although I firmly and wholeheartedly believe that Jesus can come into any situation and heal it, solve it, make it, destroy it, or do it, he does not promise he will.

Throughout this whole process, people have repeatedly said to my family and I, “Just trust that God has a plan for you – he wants you to be happy, you just have to trust him and pray.” Trust, trust, trust. Yes. I agree. I should trust the Lord with my whole heart, because he has always been faithful to me in the past. I know he is faithful.

But I think that people expect you not to hurt through the process – that simply because you know Jesus has your best in mind, you’re supposed to be happy all the time. And that’s just not the case. God lets bad, painful things happen because he knows we will grow from them. Knowing that doesn’t make any of it less painful. But we can’t grow without pain.

More prayers have been prayed from me up to God this year than probably ever before. I know that people all over have been praying for my family and I during this time, and although I believe that prayer is an incredibly powerful tool, I don’t think we’re ever prepared for God to say “no.” But he has said no to some of the things I have asked him for this year. Honestly, that has been really frustrating at times. Whenever I talk to someone about feeling discouraged by this, two words have come up again and again – submit and surrender. God wants us to get comfortable with these two hard words.

There’s a quote from the book, Provocative Faith, that I love.

“When a follower of Jesus loves his enemy, the world listens. When a follower of Jesus decidedly makes a choice to be last, communities watch in awe. When a follower of Jesus works as a peacemaker instead of creating more problems and more walls, the world is suddenly shocked…Suddenly the kingdom that Jesus spoke so passionately about is happening in front of you. And if that’s not power, I don’t know what is.”

Loving your enemies is, initially, a seemingly impossible thing to do, at least for me. The word “enemy” is a strong one, and carries intense emotions with it.

When everything falls apart, all we can do is remember: “Now these three remain – faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13:13)

God calls us to love without abandonment, which can be really hard. I read Captivating a few months ago, and out of the whole book, one thing stuck out to me more than anything else – the people who have wronged us, the people who have treated us like shit and broken our hearts – they are people who have been deeply hurt in the past too. They struggle just like we do every day, and the battle for their heart is raging. Satan wins occasionally, and that’s when people get hurt. Remembering that those who cause the pain are suffering themselves makes me much more compassionate towards them. It makes is much easier to love them, and that takes me one step closer to forgiveness.

Last semester, I gave a testimony at Crusade about some of the things I was struggling with. I talked about forgiveness, and what that has looked like in my life. I talked about meeting people where they’re at, and loving people for who they are. I talked about God’s will for our lives and how the hell we’re supposed to begin to figure out what that looks like in practical ways. I didn’t have many answers at all, and honestly, some days, I’m just as confused as I was when I gave the talk in March. But out of all the things I addressed that night, the one that I want to repeat again and again is the idea some people seem to have that we should avoid talking about how we feel.

So often, especially in Bible studies, I hear people say, “Well I was really struggling with <insert issue here> but everything’s okay now. It was pretty hard for a while, but God has really made it better and healed my heart!” Okay. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the above statement. We need testimonies like that so we can see God working in actual, practical ways in people’s lives. The problem comes in when all we hear is the finished “life is awesome again” speech.

I don’t usually agree with much that Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill in Michigan and creater of the NOOMA video series has to say, but I think he makes a really good point in his book, Velvet Elvis, when he says,

“Perhaps you have been around Christian communities enough to want nothing to do with them, and one of the reasons is the talk all seems so shallow. Like no one is talking about what really matters. I think this is a direct effect of the state of the souls of many pastors and leaders. So many leaders in Christian communities are going to fast and producing so much and accomplishing so much that they have become a shell of a person. there is no space to deal honestly with what’s going on deep inside them…I cannot lead people somewhere I am not trying to go myself. I don’t have to have arrived, I don’t have to be perfect, but I do need to be on the path. And that’s why for so many the church experience has been so shallow – so many leaders have never descended into the depths of their own souls. They haven’t done the hard, difficult, gut-wrenching work of shining the bright lights on all the years of baggage and destructive messages.”

I feel like we spend so much time trying to make it seem like we’ve got it all together that we don’t share what’s actually going on in our hearts. So much has been gained this year by just talking about what’s going on in my life. I would not have nearly any insight into any of the things I’m writing about tonight if I hadn’t gotten it from the people close to me, which never would have been shared had I not opened up about what I’m going through. It’s painful, but there is so much to be said for sharing where our hearts are at in the midst of struggle. Through doing so, I learned that people have dealt with the same stuff I have. They have been through the fire and survived, which is more comforting than any tossed around, cliché advice I have ever gotten.

A year ago, the world as I knew it completely crumbled. I felt like the rug had just been pulled out from underneath me, and nothing would ever be the same again. I questioned a lot of things about God and our purpose here. I didn’t understand why things were going down the way they were.

Sitting here, a year later, I still don’t have all the answers.

But I have seen grace, and it is the most powerful thing I have ever experienced.

I have seen love in its purest form, and it really can transform lives. I have seen God’s love change hearts, and I know that it is only through his love that any of us are even still standing.

So here’s to 2009…..may it be a year of love, grace, and truth. (And maybe a little bit more fun!)

~ by christinahelen on December 28, 2008.