messy heart.

So I’m trying to blog more. Because I love to write and I love to ramble about things and I love to talk about Jesus. So hopefully one of those three things will appeal to someone and hopefully they’ll be encouraged and challenged by the things that have encouraged and challenged me.

Lately Grace has been a really frustrating thing to wrap my mind around. I have heard my whole life that God gives His grace to us and then we stand before Him as people who have never sinned, because and ONLY because we are covered with the blood of Jesus, who never sinned. But the every day application has been lost on me lately. I operate under feelings of guilt most of the time, which is not the way that God intends for us to live. He says in 1 John that we know we have come to love the Father if we obey His commands. But also it says in Psalm 103:12, “as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” But let’s keep reading. Verses 13 and on say: “as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him; for He knows how we are formed, He remembers that we are dust.” Earlier in the passage it says, “He will not always accuse, nor will He harbor His anger forever; He does not treat us as OUR SINS DESERVE or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him” (verses 9-11). Jesus came to earth and offered His grace because He knew we could not live without it. He is not shocked our scared of our sin. Yes, He hates our sin, as we should also do, but He passionately loves us. He knows we are only dust, He knows we cannot live a righteous life apart from Him, and He knows that once He saves us, it’s still a lifelong journey of stumbling through life to follow Him. But now we have Him. We have all we could ever need. A Shield, a Comforter, a Shepherd, a Husband, a Father, a Lover of our Souls, a Celebrater of all we were made to be. Jesus intends for us to be adopted into His family irreversibly; we can never lose His love— this is done through His grace. And then to die to ourselves and walk in the ways He has designed for us—this is also through His grace. And His plans for us are always for His Glory and Our Good. He is always operating to reach people who don’t yet know His love. People who are still operating under feelings of confusion and guilt. This is demonstrative of His…. Grace. He offers it to EVERYONE and NO ONE could ever earn it. People who think the Gospel is close-minded have never really heard it. I don’t know a more encouraging theology than the one centered on Christ.

I had a conversation recently with a very wise woman about how most churches are afraid to preach the Gospel that’s in Scripture—the one that centers on Christ’s Grace, and NOT our performance. She was saying that most pastors fear that if they preach grace grace grace, the people will just go live however they want and call it Christianity. That may be true of some people, but people who truly understand how much they have been forgiven have no desire to go back out and get stuck in their sins. They have seen what is Holy and now, though they mess up daily, they desire and crave to be with Jesus and to know Him personally. It is this Grace-filled walk that is characteristic of the Christian life. We have the privilege of relating to our Forgiver and our Savior and our Helper daily as we—through His GRACE—try to live in response to all He has done for us.

I once heard a pastor say, “if the Gospel doesn’t arouse all of your heart’s joy and emotion, you don’t understand the Gospel.” So here’s my challenge. And it’s one I have struggled with many times. Does my heart still jump and turn inside when I hear the Gospel? Does yours?