My Sunday Reflections

I have had the whole day today to catch up with myself and with God.

I was listening to a couple sermons from RealityLA that I have missed in the last few weeks of training and traveling.  The most dynamic thing about Reality is that every single sermon points you to remember how much you need God, every minute of every day.  Spending today in reflection led me to think back to the events leading up to, my reasons for, and the goals I have in completing this mission.

I have always been called to serve. Since I can remember I have been battling with a crazy empathy and how crippling it can be in my life.  I have been guilty of neglecting my emotions and spirituality for the sake of others.  For a while after I realized that I was doing this to my own detriment, I hated it.  I struggled, mainly because I would only notice after finding myself terribly hurt and with deep sadness in my heart because time and time again, after having given everything I had to friends and people in my life, I was let down when I needed something in return.  Other times I would feel such incredible emotion on someone else’s behalf.  On one occasion, I remember vividly feeling conflicting emotions from two parties at the same time. It scared me how upset I found myself.

I had just arrived at school to start my junior year after spending the summer at home. We are a big family and I was developing real and adult relationships with my brothers and sisters. My eyes were slowly being opened to the history of my family and the unique pasts of each of its members. I was getting older and had started to become aware of prejudices, resentment, lack of forgiveness, deep hurt, and walls of old feelings, that had always been below my radar as a child.  A lot of change was happening in my family, a lot of growth. By this time my dad had been a recovering alcoholic for 2 years- he started AA just as I was leaving for school my freshman year.  In this process each person in my family did their best to tell him how his drinking hurt them and to give him a chance to apologize. I went into it without anything to present to him myself, but looked at it as an incredible chance for our family to come together around him, as a safe place for honesty and feelings, for reconciliation to take place, and for true forgiveness to work as a healing agent in his relationships.  As I remember it, I was let down.  I saw the hurt in my siblings, and I saw their want for my dad to suffer in them.  I’m afraid the exercise only stirred up feelings that had settled to the bottom of people’s hearts, it did not heal their hearts.

It all fell crashing down on me during a phone call with my dad.  I remember vividly that I sat on the floor in my empty room. I had just gotten off the phone with one of my sisters and couldn’t stand it any longer- the non-acceptance of his apology, the denial of his genuine love.  I didn’t know what else to do but call him immediately and tell him to not give up, to convey to him the deep worry I had that my siblings wouldn’t forgive him.  What then? I don’t remember exactly the words I said to him, but I remember that he was at work and that I was crying so hard that I had to hang up twice because I couldn’t breathe.  Do you remember the last time you cried so hard- like a toddler who just can’t stop, gasping and struggling, until finally you exhaust yourself? The feelings I was having were like a war inside me- between the hurt of my brothers and sisters, and the pleading of my father for forgiveness.

And it doesn’t stop at my family- my struggle with empathy, my faith in people, and my naiveté.  There really isn’t a self-effacing way for me to say this, but please take it as such: I have spent my entire young adult life trying to help people and putting others in front of myself.  There is NO reason to throw a person down, to belittle them, to do anything but help the good causes in their life.  There is NO right way to judge someone or to treat a person as if they are lesser than you.  There is NO reason to laugh in the face of someone’s sin, struggles, past, dreams, goals, or aspirations.  I live by these statements because Jesus has burned them in my heart.  There is no other explanation for it because as a human I am selfish, self-centered, self-absorbed, and self-seeking. Perfect example: I despised my spiritual gift because of what it did to me, how it effected my life, how others feelings were in front of my feelings.  What incredible thoughts from the fallen. How clear is my sin, how obvious are my shortcomings!

A few years ago I got a real taste of what it was like to live in the gospel and finally found the reason for and the source of my empathy. I worked and lived in it and I grew in my faith.  For a short time I was surrounded by joy everywhere I looked. But as my faith grew, so did the temptation of sin in my life, and I did not spiritually prepare myself to take it on. 

It was so easy to compartmentalize my life. My life at home in the suburbs working at church, and its counterpart my life at school in Los Angeles, sports, partying, temptation. I learned what it was to fall, by falling.  More times than I can count- if I ever wanted to.  At one point I read a passage in a C.S. Lewis that punched me square in the jaw:

“God has not been trying to test my faith or love in order to find out their quality. He knew it already. It was I who didn’t. In this trial He makes us occupy the dock, the witness box, and the bench all at once. He always knew that my temple was a house of cards. His only way of making me realize the fact was to knock it down.”

It was exactly how I felt. I was so ashamed. I was so put in my place.  I had taken pride in my ability to stand upright in my faith, to be a pillar, an example.  I did my best to be the best person I could be and when I failed I felt guilt like nothing I have ever experienced in my entire life.  I have let myself down, and I felt like I let God down.

I walked alone in my shame this past semester. I didn’t share it with any of you, I was defiant to the last and held onto the independence that pushed me to trip in the first place.  Even now I am not prepared to share more than that.  Through autumn I lived with what felt like a wall of bulletproof glass between God and me.  I knew He was there, and I wanted to get at Him, but knew I would just let Him down again and again.  It was insecurity, inadequacy, incapacity at its finest. I went to church every Sunday and got smacked around by doctrine that kept me alive week by week. I sat alone in my apartment and cried out asking God to break through the desensitization that I clouded my emotion towards Him.

Looking back I can see that all the time things were happening.  Unhealthy relationships were departing from my life, I was being given a love and loyalty for my home church in LA, and I was accepted to ITeams.  Once that acceptance happened, I felt such a sudden peace.  Not just about making the decision or having the stress of the application process over, but that it was a clear movement of God in my life, for me to come closer to Him.  Everything I had been through was just now a reminder to me- that I needed to die of myself, I needed to pick up my cross and follow Him.

There was one day that I will never forget.  It was a Sunday and another great sermon on forgiveness by Tim Chaddick, our RealityLA pastor.  He said that in our feeling guilty after repentance, in our harboring pain for forgiven sins, we are simply telling Jesus that he was not enough- that his life and his death were not enough.  We are an affront to God and the ultimate sacrifice of His son for us if we do not let go of our sins, but carry the weight of them on our shoulders.  The weight of that load is much too heavy for us to bear- there is no way that you could do it! I left church and put a facebook status up saying “the cross is enough”.  A few hours later I was hanging out with friends and they asked about the meaning of the message.  A 3hour conversation ensued where I had the honor of discussing theology with 2 college men.  I had never seen either of them in a room without television, music, or video games. Only God knows the contents of their hearts, but the door was opened for both of them and it was an incredibly memorable day.  Not only did I have an opportunity to talk about my faith, but it was with two people I care dearly about and who I never would have approached on my own.  It was a great reminder of God’s power, that nothing is impossible or too big for Him.  By the time Christmas break rolled around, things started to fall beautifully into place.  Healthy relationships were growing in strength and meaning, trip plans were coming along, and I was starting to believe that I could do this- but only by the grace of God.

And I am here for that lesson to be branded on my soul.  I wanted this experience to strengthen my heart for Christ, to help me train up a guardian.  Being a Christian is never going to be easy, I will always stumble.  But in taking myself out of anything familiar, in moving away from temptations and separating from my struggles, I have put myself in a place to solely rely on God and His plan for me.  Please know that I am not running away from anything, nothing pushed or scared me away.  I am simply running toward a place of trust.  The experience I have serving God’s kingdom here in South Africa is not mine.  It is God’s for me.  I am trying to understand more fully the meaning of complete reliance.

“You’ll never know that Jesus is all you need, until Jesus is all you have.”

…Shortly after completing this post the internet gave out- which is why this is posted late.  Also a gift that I had brought from home, which was very important to me, was found in ruins today upon my return home from work.  I am getting what I came for…