The last post I put up–with my questions and wonderings about individuality and how it relates to my being a creation of God–came from a journal entry I wrote over a year ago. It’s been sitting and sitting, but when I finally was able to post something (sorry for the gap), it came to my mind rather than something written more recently.
I posted it on Friday, and that night I went to a church service and we sang the song “Take, O Take Me As I Am”. “This,” I thought, “relates so beautifully to that blog post.” I have found myself singing/praying it off-and-on ever since, and I want to share it with you. The link above (the title) takes you to Hymnary.org, which has information on the song’s author, Scotsman John Bell, and, when you scroll the bottom of the page, the actual music (so those of you who are musicians can play it), and this link is a Youtube video of a choir singing the song.
When I read the following post to my husband (he and my mother-in-law serve as a sounding board for nearly everything I put on the blog), he responded, “I’ve never ever asked myself the questions you wonder about in this piece, but I’m assuming that if you’ve wondered it, someone else has, so, yes, post it.” I then asked him, “Do you think I’m out on a theological limb in this one–just a bit?” At that he grinned, half-shrugged, and said, “Maybe a little, but not too much.” (I’ve done some adjusting since I first read it to him, and I think I’ve moved closer to the trunk.) SO, if you choose to read on, just know I am NOT claiming this is solid theology but simply, as titled, my mind’s meanderings on my being/personhood/individuality.
It all started with these questions: If I am accepted ONLY in Christ, then does God love ME? For that matter, who am I? If I am called to become more and more like Christ, then WHO am I becoming? How can I still be ME and yet be like Christ? And WHO, exactly, is God loving? Me or Christ in me?
Scripture tells me I have no “good” in me, but it also says I am made in the image of God. I have value as God’s creation in general (like the sparrows) and, to a greater extent, because of that image.
I still wonder, though, do I have value simply in being myself?
I go back to my earlier statement: without God I have no being. I am NOT.
Yet I am. Even in a state of alienation from God—my pre-redeemed state—I have been given being. I am able to think and reason and love and hate and feel pain and joy.
I certainly do not FEEL like a puppet.
Nor did Jesus Christ–very God/very man–treat people as puppets. That, right there, wows me. Each person He encountered was His own creation. He could have chosen NOT to create any of them. In one sense, they were nothing more than clay in His hands.
Yet He treated each person as an individual. He treated each with respect as a human, as an individual. Even when He came down hard on a person or a group of people, it was never belittling but related to the choice they had made to set or follow their own standard/to be their own god–and they were definitely faced with the option of choosing differently. (I think of Nicodemus as a particular example of this.)
We are not only treated as individuals; we ARE so individual—down to our fingerprints, as if God is saying, “I am so big I am able to put a unique image of myself in every single one of you, and I will never have to duplicate or repeat.” (We get a beautiful picture of this in Psalm 139, in which the writer, David, imagines God being present–right there–shaping him in utero uniquely and specifically–no cookie cutter “creation” going on.)
This brings me back to my original question: Who am I? But now I realize that there are two ways to ask that question, one good and one bad. The bad way is when I am wanting an individuality/personhood that is separate from God, from being His, from being linked to Him as the Source and the Sustainer.
And isn’t that the same desire Satan had?
Lucifer wanted to be Lucifer on His own. He didn’t want to maintain his being as an angel OF God. He wanted to be Lucifer, just Lucifer. He didn’t want God to be linked to his being.
God granted Lucifer’s request. I know Lucifer was cast out of heaven, but he wasn’t annihilated. Can anything that God creates ever by truly annihilated?
So Lucifer “won,” in the sense that a rebellious child “wins” autonomy. He was allowed to separate. We see the consequences. Lucifer has lost all good. He has NO good impulses. He never creates, only destroys. He destroyed Eve–and then Adam and all their offspring–with the same temptation.
When I want to be MYSELF (and I am speaking here as one who is following Christ), am I trying to separate from Christ in me? Am I trying to fill the God-blank inside me with ME (pure self-focus). And in so doing, do I, like Satan, ironically, become capable only of destruction, never creation?
Hmm. I am imagining the “God-blank” as a sphere within our souls that has a beautiful, unique shape but which is un-filled. It is merely keeping a portion of my soul from being tainted with the selfishness/self-focus that permeates the rest of me. That empty sphere will either be filled with God or be overtaken by all the rest. In its empty state, it has no power to DO good, only to keep space for Good to enter in. When Christ enters it, His Good has power and begins its work in me, renewing me.
My mind returns to Nicodemus here: is this somehow related to “being born of the Spirit”? When I surrender and say, I am Yours, God. You work Your new creation in me, exactly as YOU want to, then am I born anew to be the ME He originally intended? So, though I am becoming more like Christ, with more of God filling me, yet He is filling me uniquely so that MY becoming like Christ is wholly different than my husband or my children or any other person becoming like Him. Together we are His body, but each cell within it is individual.
He is too great to simply duplicate Himself or even a small portion of Himself. There is TOO much of Him to ever be exhausted.
So perhaps God says to each of us: “You are YOU. Yes, you are from me, yet you are you, and the more you surrender to ME, the more you become the YOU I designed you to be. I take joy in your uniqueness because you display ME uniquely.
“When you are focused on self, you are not YOU—the real YOU is being overcome. The real YOU is completely at peace in your being my intricate masterpiece. You lose self-focus and, in so doing, become more YOU.”
All this is too big for me, but I end in awe rather than confusion because I have returned to my Creator. I place my weary, addled head on His chest; I feel His loving arms encircle me; and my spirit is reminded that He is for me.
Immutability: a big word meaning changeless, not capable of or susceptible to change
I’ve been very grateful for that attribute of God lately. As if it’s not enough that I live in a culture in which change is constant (in fact, change is one of its few constants), in a home with so many personalities (six kids, three of them teenage girls), and in a schedule that is both crazy and fluctuating…
I also am crazy and fluctuating.
I can be happy and joyous one hour and overwhelmed by all the pain and injustice in the world the next. One moment I can be confident in the sovereignty of God; in the next I am doubting and fearful. I remember at times that my security and identity rest in God, but I forget that truth daily (okay, more like every hour–or more) and find myself swinging between insecurity and pride as I compare myself with others.
With all that, God’s immutability is a wonder, a blessing, a miracle.
So when I reached the end of Hebrews today and read these words, I found in them a treasure. I hope they are the same for you.
And because that is true–that Jesus Christ is never swayed because HE IS the great I AM (never the “I was” or the “I will be,” always the “I AM”)–then the benediction that follows can also be constantly true.
The daily grind, whatever it is for each of us, becomes “ordinary,” but it is anything but. In reality, what we consider “ordinary” is supernatural, filled with the common grace of God.
I remember an idea from a Tim Keller sermon (he’s been a favorite of late): Does someone in your life love you? Is there someone to hold your hand? Does someone ask you how your day is going and sometimes even listen when it’s not going so well?
Grace—it’s all grace. You didn’t do anything to deserve any of that, and without Grace, you wouldn’t experience any of it.
I remember a comment I heard a family counselor make on a radio show. “We humans are not hard-wired for real relationship. Deep down, if we are truthful, we have a “what’s in it for me?” expectation about every single relationship we are in—even the parent-to-child relationship. The only reason I can see for any human relationship retaining even a trace of goodness is completely the grace of God.”
Thinking of these two comments, I try to imagine “ordinary” with all common grace removed. The first images that pop up are from Cormac McCarthy’s post-apocalyptic book The Road, in which lawlessness prevails; the strong prey upon any weaker than they, with no pity; and no “human decency” remains. The one relationship readers would call “normal”—that of a father and son who care for each other—is in stark contrast to everyone else. For the sake of food and shelter, people will do anything, even kill and eat their own children.
For those who have not read The Road, just imagine “ordinary” without common grace as the worst moments of the Holocaust or the Rwandan genocide, as the inside of a brothel; as the continual torture inflicted upon prisoners of war.
In this kind of “ordinary,” there is no such thing as a mother’s and father’s natural love for children, no sense of morality or “right,” no conscience at all. There is no such thing as respect and concern for one’s fellow man.
This is hard to fathom in my “ordinary” world. Common grace is so, well, common. But if God withdrew His active goodness–which is present in this world without us giving Him a single reason to give it—the result would be hellish, brutal.
This should transform my idea of “ordinary”—which I far too often think of as a burden. It should enable me to see my ordinary—with its daily grind and up-and-down relationships and disappointments and boredom and longing for “something more”—as truly a miracle.
When I think of my family and friends as miraculous gifts, then all the daily grind related to relationship with them can be transformed as well: meal prep, grocery shopping, carpooling, laundry, maybe even cleaning (though I’m not sure if that one fits in my “ordinary” category—extraordinary perhaps?).
We humans often want a change IN our ordinary. We often covet the “ordinary” of other people. “If only…” we think. But, in truth, a change in mindset, not a change in circumstances, is what transforms our ordinary.
And that, God reminds us, is a job the He is eager to do for and with us.
Hallelujah!
Verses for study:
Romans 12:2– The Amplified has so much richness, but the New Living lays it out plain and clear. The link above takes you to a page with both translations side by side.
Romans 8:6– This link, too, takes you to both the Amp and the NLT side by side.
This morning I glanced through an old issue (May/June of ’07) of a Discipleship Journal (a fantastic NavPress magazine that ceased publication about six years ago) and read an article titled “The 20 Minute Worship Challenge” by Becky Harling. In it she describes how beginning each day with a concentrated time of praise transformed a difficult season in her life. Harling praised in different ways: singing along with music, “praising” through the alphabet, and reading praise Psalms aloud. Following her article was an inset titled “Praises from A to Z,” an excerpt from the book Pray with Purpose, Live with Passion by Debbie Williams (which, by the way, looks really good! Click on the title above to visit its Amazon page.)
I didn’t read the inset piece because I was about to head out for a run, and I wanted to pray my own praise alphabet during the first part of it. I can’t now remember all the words I came up with, but a few stuck with me long enough to write them down. I’m leaving the ones I can’t recall blank in case you want to fill them in for yourself.
My Running ABCs of Praise
A: Awe. I was just starting the run, and the heavy humidity hadn’t yet drenched me. The light was hazy through the treetops, and I was in awe that God had created the waving branches and that specific quality of light that would so bedazzle my eyes.
B: ______________
C: Care. “He careth for you(me).” That phrase from my King James Version-steeped childhood chimed in my head. He—GOD of the universe—CARES for itty-bitty me.
D: ________________
E: Excellent. He is excellent—in all facets. Full marks in everything. Enough said. Come to think of it, “enough” is good, too. He is—enough.
F: Fair. “Fairest Lord Jesus, Ruler of all nature/O Thou of God and man the Son/Thee will I cherish, Thee will I honor/Thou, my soul’s glory, joy and crown.” Old hymn—but still and always true.
G: Good. Wholly GOOD, no bad in Him at all. AT ALL. Good—to the core, to the very last drop, in all His beings/doings/imaginings. (Don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine being that good. Snotty thoughts of one kind or another pass through my mind on a very regular basis–sometimes most frequently when I’m trying to be most good!)
H: Healer. Oh, how I have experienced God’s work in my life as my healer, the great Physician who sees my brokenness and knows how to cure it.
I: Inimitable. Great word meaning “not able to be imitated.” Very true. Lucifer tried. Humanity tried. Both failed—with disastrous results. Only the inimitable God is completely uncorrupted by power.
J: ___________________
K: Kind. I tell my kids all the time I don’t want them to be merely “nice.” I want them to be KIND. Nice is a polite smile, an averted gaze, a penny in the bucket. Kind is a helping hand, a listening ear, a shared laugh–or cry, and a walking alongside. Kind can even be tough when it needs to be. Nice is focused on me; kind is focused on what is good for the other person.
L: Love. Basic but mind blowing. God is LOVE. Wow.
M: Mysterious. Not a tame lion, our Jesus, our God, but One Who must be true only to Himself. He doesn’t answer to me, the President, anybody. Just Himself, and He’s so big He’s unfathomable to us tiny-brained humans. That makes Him pretty mysterious.
M: Mine (I couldn’t resist a second one for “m” because, oh, my word, the mysterious God of the universe allows me to call Him “mine.”)
N: _______________
O: (Later I thought of “Omega,” but that felt like cheating. So I’m putting it here but also confessing.)
P: _________________
Q: Quintessence. Besides simply being a cool word, it’s a fantastic descriptor for God, and specifically for Christ. “The most perfect embodiment of something.” Christ is the ultimate quintessence of God.
S: Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Wow—that word is in spellcheck! Thank you, Mary Poppins and P. L. Travers. If ever anyone deserves this most scrumptious and sing-able of multi-syllabic words, it’s God.
T: Tried and true. “True” as in “real”—see letter “r.” “Tried” as in “never failing” and willing to prove this to us time and again and again so we can know this through personal experience.
U: Ubiquitous. Honest, it really was the first word that came to mind (okay, maybe “unique” popped up first, but it was immediately rejected as being too blah). But then—more honesty—I thought, “You know, I’m not quite sure what ‘ubiquitous’ means.” Well, I looked it up later, and it means “existing or being everywhere; especially at the same time; omnipresent.” PERFECT!
V: Verity. Another word from the KJV. “The state or quality of being true; accordance with fact or reality.” Psalm 111:7 “The works of his hands are verity and judgment; all his commandments are sure.”
W: Whirlwind. I know it’s a weird choice, but one of the things I most appreciate about God (after the fact, at least) is that He is willing to come into my life and heart at times with a gust-like force that disturbs me, that makes me take inventory, that makes me change.
X: Xylophone didn’t fit. If you come up with any, let me know.
Z: Zenith. “highest point or state; culmination.” A good descriptor for God and a proper ending for this list.
Note: I have also used the alphabet for intercessory prayer for others. I just pray for a person/situation/organization/place I know that begins with the letter A (or several) and then move on to the rest of the letters.
*Scroll to the bottom of this post for the audio version.
We puppy-sat Nora, a 14-week-old English Bulldog, last week, and my children, as well as many of the neighborhood kids, were enamored with her.
PJ, Nora, and Chai playing tug of war
But soon they discovered the not-so-pleasant side of caring for a pup. “She’s like a baby in her judgment but with a lot more mobility,” I reminded them when she chomped a plant in the garden, peed on the living room rug, or left tooth pricks in a Barbie doll’s arm.
“It’s a good thing she’s cute, huh?” I asked them. “Children and puppies. They require a lot of work, but at least they’re adorable.”
Chai was the only one who was happy to see Nora go back to her owners. Of course, the rest of us didn’t have a puppy clawing at our face all week either.
They glared at her squashed face a moment more and then relented.
“Yeah.”
I find I still have that mentality with God.
He loves me because there is something inherently endearing about me.
I would never say it aloud, but the belief is there sometimes.
But the older I get, the more I understand how untrue it is—of myself or anyone, no matter how honorable or upright we seem.
In Lamentations, Jeremiah speaks of “compassionate” women of Jerusalem cooking and eating their own children (4:10). Before the starvation brought about by the siege of Babylon, these same women would have been appalled at the thought, but distress revealed a darkness in their hearts that had been there all along.
It is hard for me, too, to imagine myself capable of the horrific acts I read about in news articles. But I am. Put me in the right (or wrong) circumstances, strip me of comforts and necessities, replace my upbringing with an abusive situation…
“But for the grace of God,” my father used to say.
This truth is actually not discouraging (despite how it makes us feel). Reminders of our incapacity for good help us see that the love of God is certain—no matter what we do or don’t do.
This past season my husband’s soccer team made a poster for their locker room, and they put it right above the doorway they walk through on their way to the field. It read, big and bold, “Play like you’re loved.”
Perfect love casts out fear.
The fear we all have of God (it’s a good and necessary place to start in our relationship with Him) is based on the right belief that we can never measure up. God answered this fear with a love that fully accepts our inability to deserve it. His love has no conditions for us. We cannot earn it, and He has never expected us to.
Yet we still “play to be loved,” and we are always disappointed to find that all our efforts effect no true change in us. We do all kinds of good works and find that the bitterness or envy or self-loathing in our hearts is still there!
How paradoxical that only when we give up the striving to change ourselves can we be changed—by a love that is not dependent on our changing!
In the early pages of The Practice of the Presence of God, written about and by Brother Lawrence, a lay monk in the 17th century, his interviewer shared this about him. “When he sinned, he confessed it to God with these words: ‘I can do nothing better without You. Please keep me from falling and correct the mistakes I make.’ After that he did not feel guilty about the sin.” … “Brother Lawrence was aware of his sins and was not at all surprised by them. ‘That is my nature,’ he would say, ‘the only thing I know how to do.’ He simply confessed his sins to God, without pleading with Him or making excuses. After this, he was able to peacefully resume his regular activity of love and adoration. If Brother Lawrence didn’t sin, he thanked God for it, because only God’s grace could keep him from sinning.”
It is biblical to sorrow over our sin, but when we beat ourselves up over it, it is a reverse kind of pride. We get down on ourselves because we believe we are capable of better.
But we’re not, and it is far more profitable to confess and move on into God’s unconditional love. Confession is simply admitting to God, “I am sinful, and You are not. I acknowledge that great difference and Your perfection, and I am grateful You did something about it.”
He did do something about our inability! He did something incredible! And the result of that amazing sacrifice is that He is in us! We are in Him!
The “Play like you’re loved” poster came from the team’s season verse, John 17:23, in which Christ says, “I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
This day, let’s play, live, work, and be like we are loved!
It was a Saturday morning after a late Friday night. Husband out of town. Schedule packed with kids’ activities and cleaning my messy house (I don’t mind laundry or dishes, but whole-house cleaning brings out my nasty).
I was still in bed but mentally working through my to-do list when I heard my younger three coming down the stairs. I hopped out of bed… and discovered I’d gotten up on the wrong side.
I was grumpy—from the get-go!
They came in with iPad in hand, a Youtube Disney music video blaring.
More grumpy. “Can’t you guys start off the day with a book or a game? Why do you have to go straight to screen time?”
“We’ll just watch this one video, and then we’ll be done, Mom.”
I grunted my assent and went upstairs to begin de-cluttering so I could then clean.
Five minutes.
iPad still going.
Ten minutes.
iPad still going.
Deeper grumpiness, and the homework-and-craft-covered dining room table wasn’t improving my mood.
I stomped downstairs. “I told you guys to stop watching videos after that first one.”
Wide, innocent eyes. “It’s the same video, Mom.”
I looked at the screen, and, yes, it was the same 36-minute long Youtube video.
“You knew I didn’t mean you could watch a video that’s more than a half hour long!”
Still wide-eyed.
“Seriously!”
Suddenly one of my sons was right in front of me. He put his arms around my neck and held his face up for a kiss.
And, honest to goodness, this is what came out of my mouth. “I don’t want a kiss right now. I’m trying to fuss at you and your brother and sister.”
Seriously!
More encouragement from one of my kids. Em hung these creations of hers on the fridge yesterday. Such good reminders.
That was when the Holy Spirit smacked me upside the head.
What I’d said sunk in, and I looked down into the face of the son who is getting a lot better at reading my moods—and who wants to fix me when I clearly display my brokenness.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. You’re right. I do want a kiss.”*
I said my “sorry”s for my grumpiness, got my kids doing something more productive than watching videos (though they would certainly disagree with my evaluation), and went back to straightening.
But though I was more aware and cautious of my mood, I was still in it.
When I went upstairs to check on how Maddie was doing at cleaning her room, she asked me, “Mom, would you want to have devotions with me?”**
Another Holy Spirit moment: I answered, “Mads, that’s a great idea.”
We read it together on her bed.
Then we looked at each other. “That was exactly what I needed to hear,” I told her. “Thank you.”
She nodded wisely. “That happens a lot for me, too.”
In one morning I received the kiss of forgiveness and the olive branch of restoration.
Oh, the lessons I learn from my children.
*The reason I didn’t use a name for this child is that he is at the age when he doesn’t want too much affection in public (“Only side hugs, please, Mom.) and doesn’t want to be called “honey,” “sweetheart,” or “baby” unless it’s inside the walls of our home. So if you’re reading this and you actually know my family, don’t mention this story to any of my kids and please don’t repeat it to any kids they know. If you do, my days of hugging my son may be over for a really long time.
**We gave Maddie the kids’ version of Jesus Calling for Easter. I highly recommend it for kids aged about 8 and up. I used it a couple years ago with high school students, and many of them still preferred the kid version over the adult one.
How do you lose joy? She must have failed to hold onto it. Perhaps she’d forgotten it completely, left it in a corner, and it had wandered off, hoping to find a home where it wouldn’t be neglected. “I’ve lost my joy,” she tells her husband, and he nods.
Oh dear, it’s noticeable! she thinks.
Where do you begin looking for joy?
She tries singing as she does the tasks that annoy her most. She hums as she packs the children’s lunches, warbles in the car, belts it out when she de-clutters the living room.
Where are you, joy? she wonders, I can’t sing any louder. Can’t you hear me?
She tries putting on a show of it. Didn’t she hear a pastor say once that the outward action of love can kindle the feeling?
Or was that her college drama director talking about action and emotion?
She’s not sure, but she tries it.
Smile, she tells herself.
Smile bigger!
She shoves grumpiness down. She swats selfish thoughts like pesky gnats.
Joy, come back! Please.
She is sitting, alone at her desk, absorbed in work, when she senses a presence nearby.
Joy? Are you there? I caught a glimpse of you.
Man, I wish my knees still bent like that!
But when the house bustles again, when children’s squabbles break the quiet—joy recedes.
Oh, she realizes, I am allowing the noise to drive joy away. But joy doesn’t have to have peace and quiet. Joy doesn’t mind chaos, excitement.
I haven’t lost joy.
I’ve sent it away.
I am telling it when it can be present, and when it can’t.
How do I invite joy into my full life—all of it? How do I keep from shutting it out?
Still missing joy, she goes to the Good Friday service.
It is good to reflect, to be with others, all reflecting together.
They sing, they read, they listen.
But she is waiting, though she doesn’t know what she is waiting for.
There is something here for me tonight, she thinks. I’m not sure how I know this, but I do.
The sermon is finished. They have taken communion. Her shoulders slump. It was good, but…
The pastor speaks again. “Some of you have lost your joy,” he says. “You’ve lost the joy of your salvation, your redemption. Come to the cross.”
Her hands tremble.
Her body feels light.
She knows this is for her.
It may be for others as well, but it is clearly for her.
But she will have to get up, cross the room, walk in front of so many sets of eyes.
He is still speaking. “Come. We will pray for you, that here at the cross you will remember your source of joy.”
She gets up, quick.
Her husband, beside her, stands, too.
“Do you want me to come with you?”
She nods.
By the time they reach the cross, there are others.
I am not the only one, she thinks. We have all lost joy.
Pastors pray. She hears only snatches of their words over the music.
But that is all right, because it is the song she needs to hear.
“Behold the man upon the cross,
My sin upon his shoulders;
Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice
Call out among the scoffers.
It was my sin that held him there…”
Somehow, in the second of space before the next line of the song, she experiences guilt, sorrow, despair. I did send you there. It was my sin. It was my selfishness. Oh God, I love You, but I don’t know how to stop hurting You. I am unable to pull my thoughts away from myself, away from what I am feeling or not feeling.
All this in a God-stretched moment.
And then…
“Until it was accomplished;
His dying breath has brought me life—
I know that it is finished.”
Stop, she commands herself. See truth. Christ does not have to die again. He has done it! I AM redeemed. It is not the chaos that is driving joy away; it is my fear that when I sink into moodiness, into selfishness, that I have stepped out of redemption. But that can never be. He finished it.
“I will not boast in anything,
No gifts, no pow’r, no wisdom;
But I will boast in Jesus Christ,
His death and resurrection.
…
But this I know with all my heart,
His wounds have paid my ransom.”
Paid, accomplished, finished—in a transaction that is outside the scope of time. It is not undone when she grows grumpy yet again, not taken back when she fails or is petty. She looks up at the Christ figure on the cross. Through that finished work, she tellsherself, I am redeemed. My sin does not for one single moment make that untrue. It is present and ongoing, without conditions. Without resting at all on me. I can have joy IN my grumpiness. It is not limited only to when I am feeling peaceful and good but is a reality even when I am fully aware of my own sinful nature.
She feels her husband’s hands on her shoulders. They have been there all along. She just now senses their gentle weight.
“Behold the man upon a cross,
My sin upon His shoulders”
He took it from me—and He abolished it. Why do I try to carry what He has already taken?
NOTES: 1. If anyone reading this is a poet and has suggestions (and would be willing to share them), I would LOVE to hear them. 2. Because I don’t really feel this is “finished,” I didn’t record this one.
Jen Underwood 