Grace for Grace

I've been neglecting the Baptist Christianity that I grew up with, the somber and deep love for the correct ways of God. The Proverbs kind of faith that is the fruit of the relationship.  I haven't known how to combine both ways of relating to God: the ethereal, every breath holy because He walks with me, grace and freedom, feelingsy faith that I am now so comfortable living in, with the freedom within boundaries, submission and obedience, fear of the Lord faith that I was afraid of.  I think I was afraid of it because when I was younger that I was all I knew and it felt devoid of life, but God is not just what I want Him to be, He is all of it. And I have felt a desire to move into the quieter, grounded obedience of submitting my feelings and flesh to God's way.  I know that is an easy thing to say, and it feels good to say it because it's "righteous" and then I can pat myself on the back for having great intentions. If I know one thing about God, I know that...

 Ah February, the month of love. At work, coworkers are asking if I have plans, if I like Valentines day, would I rather get flowers or chocolate, etc.  But thankfully I don't have to partake in any of that because right now I am unattached. Footloose and fancy free, as the kids say.  When you're a Christian girl, you grow up learning that crushes are bad, that you should only think about boys as your brothers in Christ, and that you are too young for all that, until one day you wake up and realize that all your friends have boyfriends, some are getting married, and you're still stuck thinking that having a crush is embarrassing. <---Is this autobiographical? ...maybe.  But I've recently been able to express those immature things to myself without shame, without belittling myself, and I've talked to God about it.  I used to talk to God about it, too, but back then it was prayers of false holiness and embarrassment, but now it is another facet of freedom, of b...

 Everyone does this, don't they? Start something with excitement and motivation, but then life gets in the way and it becomes a chore and no one is forcing you to do it so it just...drifts away.  But I'll try to actually remember. Fingers crossed.  ~~ New Year's Eve seemed to be a sign of how January would go. On a night that I usually try to stuff full of meaning and feeling because I'm afraid of time slipping away and losing a chance to prove myself, I went to bed early. And this month hasn't felt hurried or stressful, I haven't put pressure on myself to perform any certain way. It is freeing. And I know that it is ultimately the handiwork of the One who frees.  I think overall I just feel less pressure. I think this process was started when I realized that 20 doesn't have to look any certain way, and is continuing into all these other measurements of productivity and value that I used to place so much weight on. If I actually stop to think about it, I thi...

 God's love is the simplest subject that I keep returning to. It continues to challenge me. I will think I have grasped it, and then something will happen, and I will feel all those same feelings that I have felt since I was a preteen: shame, embarrassment, and those pangs of false holiness that tell me I should have done better.  Today I was driving home from work and turned on the radio. The song could not have been more timely. "Let me introduce you to amazing grace. No matter the bumps, no matter the bruises, still the truth is, the cross has made you flawless. ...the cross was enough." It is the foundation for salvation and yet I cannot grasp it. Whethor it's pride, fear, or plain human stupidity, I am constantly having to relearn that nothing I could do on my own will make me "holy enough" to go to the Father. It is out of my hands, it just is. It is remarkable pride to believe that the cross is not enough to take every sin that I have every committed ...

 Entering my 20s feels really special and really new, not just because of the novelty of being two decades, but I feel like there has been an invitation to mark this new decade with some foundational growth, again. My teenage years were all discovery and amazement and big emotions that I didn't know I was allowed to have, and now... I want to step aside, I want to take a back seat and quiet whatever keeps me from hearing God. I'm starting to learn what being a lamb in a world of wolves can mean for me, the softness and genuine gentleness that I am reaching for, that I feel every time I focus on God. It is the peace and love of the Comforter, which maybe sounds unattainable to strive to bring others the peace of the Holy Spirit, but...the Bible said that He would teach us all things so I don't know why He would hold that back.  I want to be gentle, I don't want to be quick to judgement or opinion. I've always had opinions, I was raised in a family that wasn't ove...

 "We have never seen a sane human." by I don't know. Basically, no one has gotten out unscathed or unscarred. Every single person in the world has a hurt or trauma or fear or sOMETHING that is rooted deeply in their chest.  That is the beauty of Jesus. we are all hurt or bruised in some way and we are all forgiven and held and healed in a greater way.  We are invited to view the world through His eyes, to see those broken and patched over hearts that are aching for love and aching for recognition. His mercy is freedom, it is healing.  "It is finished." He came once, and for all, and we can't do anything to change the truth of that. We are uncomfortable with the fact that His sacrifice is the final word because it goes against our pride and our false holiness and our whatever else that we have twisted religion into. We are saved by Him and Him alone, and we can't do a thing to change that. We are not powerful enough to stop His love for us. Are we truly t...

 This year my view of marriage has really soured. For various reasons, both personal and societal, there have been a lot of lies that I have believed about marriage and this year I think I saw those beliefs for the first time and felt how wrong they were. I wrongly associated them with the infrastructure of marriage when they were things that flawed humans had created.  Marriage was God's creation, not man's, which means that I can't listen to man's words or examples of marriage and take them as fact because they are just opinion, not truth.  So what is the truth about marriage?  In the Bible, the basis for marriage is this: " For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh."  Man and woman as one flesh, one unit together. And the second greatest commandment (and also lowkey the hardest) is to love others as we love ourselves. I think we also le...