Thoughts on the Gospel and...

What follows are peices of conversations I've had with people regarding various aspects of the Gospel. I thought I'd share a few of them with you...


The Gospel and The Realities of my Life

It is so true that God is the ultimate filler of our deepest needs and desires... and even our voids. He alone has to be the one in which we find our identity, security, worth, etc. I have found it so much easier to deal with life when my eyes are fixed on him and he is my security.

I know that no matter what I have gone through or experienced, God has made me a new creation and I don't have to live under the power of "what was". I have come to absolutely love the person God has made me. Not because I'm anything phenomenal, but because it is so freeing to simply be the person he created and designed. Although I am constantly learning new things about God and about myself, I do rest secure in who he is - God.

I have never wanted to think about my childhood. I have never wanted to search the depths of my life's experiences. Those are things that I naturally would love to sweep under the rug and move forward in life in the name of "keeping my eyes on Christ" and "God makes me new so it doesn't matter". In my naturally ignorant being, I would love to ignore my past.

The crazy thing is that, as I have found more and more security in God, he has freed me to see things in a new light. The more I find my identity in him, the more he takes me by the hand and begins to show me things about myself and about how to become more Christ-like. Some of those things he has begun to work in me, are things that force me to face my past and deal with the realities of my life.

I keep thinking about the story of Jesus and the woman at the well. In their conversation, Jesus could have easily revealed himself and then said "go and sin no more"... which he did... but not until he made her face the reality of her life; she had been with many men and her past had created a cycle of that in her present life. She had to face that because she was facing who Christ is and what he wanted to do in her life.

I know that my relationship with Christ is a constant transformation of myself. I don't think, by any means, that filling in the gaps of my memory or finding answers to my past will somehow cause me to "arrive" or to finally be the person I'm suppose to be. There is no "arriving" but rather a continuous transforming. To me, that is the most beautiful thing about how God works. I recognize that me asking all these questions and learning about my past is just a part of that transformation. (That is not to say that everyone needs to do what I'm doing... I'm just saying that for me, right now, this is something God is doing in me.)

I am confident that no matter what I find out about my past, whether all my questions are answered or remain unknown, I am confident that I will remain secure with Christ, that he will continue to work in me, that he will continue to be my everything. Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, right? I take hold of that as I am on this journey.


The Gospel and The Wrestling

I am doing well. I am uncovering deep truths about myself and about God. I believe that as I wrestle with God, with truth and with people, that I will continue to uncover more and more. I don’t believe God ever intends that wrestling to end. Life is a refining process, a journey, sometimes a battle.

I have lived most of my life believing that if I was wrestling with anything, if I was questioning anything, “working on my issues”, then I wasn’t doing well. I have come to realize, though, that it is in that wrestling that God makes something beautiful out of my life. So if I am wrestling, I consider myself to be doing pretty damn well.

I am a broken being living in a broken world. God is leading me through a process of healing but I don’t believe that it will come to completion until this life is through. So if I’m walking in that process, I am doing well.
It doesn’t always look great from the outside. Usually, it’s pretty messy. So I can understand how someone could assume, from the outside, that I wouldn’t be doing well as I struggle through this life.

But the day I stop wrestling, the day I think I’m healed, the moment I feel able to walk on my own two feet, is the day I will say I’m not doing well. To me, this is a radically different view of life than the one I was brought up on. However, it is this truth that is revealed to me as I honestly seek to understand the gospel, and it has given me a freedom that I feel I’ve been repressed from throughout most of my life.


The Gospel and The Fullness of Life

I am all about being sensitive to God’s leading and following the spirit. I want nothing more than to be surrendered to God and live a life that glorifies him. But in that, I think God is about creating a full life for me, too; one that allows me to follow my hearts desires and passions in a way that works within his kingdom.
By that, I mean that I think there are two concepts that work in tandem with each other. On one hand I think God guides and directs us, sometimes to places and situations that we may not understand at the time. On the other hand, I also think that God created each of us unique, with passions, talents, etc., that he wants us to use to his glory. So for example, I have this huge passion for and talent of writing. I believe God gave me that ability and intends for me to use it in a way that honors him (however that looks).

Very often, I have seen Christians act and talk like doing things that make the individual happy, are bad. Like, for me to follow my passion of writing is bad because it's selfish, or it's all about me. When in reality, it's God who gave me that passion and I think I can use it in a myriad of ways that are all glorifying to him.

John 10:10 talks about how Christ came to give us life and to give it more abundantly (or to the full). I don't think this is limited to eternity. I think God created life here on earth for us to experience to the fullest. It can be a great and amazing thing - life. I have felt before that many Christians pound on the "self sacrifice" and "martyr" drum so much that they don't truly enjoy life; they just try to find one more "good work" to do for God or one more thing they can sacrifice for God. I feel like they give up so much of life that God actually intends for us to enjoy. Life here on earth is not inherently bad, simply because we're living in a fallen world.