Naked: Conviction, and Hope

This week was the end of the semester - a feat of victory and process of insanity. After Tuesday, I took two half days to simply recover. Today waking up at 7:45a felt like an feat worth announcing to the world. Aside from the chaos of work, balancing of employee lives, we have been proactively building relationships with our local church community and thus have busy mostly every night. (A good tired, but nonetheless even me the endless socialite found herself drained Sunday night.) This week has been a dance around conviction, obsession, and hope.

Conviction

We have all made mistakes. Some of them are quickly forgotten. Others have such a cause-and-effect that we live with their consequences for years, maybe decades. Finances and anger(control?) seem to be my biggest mistakes, my cumulative sins. Both tend to be rooted from the need to control, and the complete inability to control. Thus excuses flood my mouth when confronted about either of these, "I didn't know better", "I'm exhausted  I can't help it", "It's your fault not mine". I tend to push my inability to handle shame onto the next person to me - often my lovely husband. I have demanded control since our premarital counseling - though I preached it to be equality, it was a flipping of the gender being subordinated. There are dozens of reasons I can explain to you my anti-men feminism, a belief that really just put me into the position of causing oppression and hurt. But that is another story. Instead today is about conviction.
I don't handle shame, as I have already mentioned. I don't like to be wrong, no one does; but a wrongness that reaches down into my core - the motivator of my decisions - that is simply too much for me. I shutdown. I yell. I curse. I temporarily lose the blessed peace of mind my Savior afforded to me. But at the very least I will project that shame onto the other, causing them a depth of pain and condemnation too deep for a simple apology, and bind them to a sin not their own in order to afford my freedom. I've seen it with my husband, but have tried to pretend I don't see it, excusing it by the sins he has committed. However when you see it on a four old daughter of heaven, there is no ignoring that sin. What mother can leave her child tied in condemning bondage that is of her (the mother's) own making? I don't want to do that anymore. It's a cycle I've found helpful to avoid changing, but its time to change - time to stand in the Light and not be afraid of the condemnation I may find.

"But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain." 
"There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death."

"God is not in control." A wonderful woman I know said that this week. I paused and realized the truth of her words. "He is sovereign  working all things to His good, but He is not a control freak." I responded that if God Almighty is not allowed to be a control freak, than neither can I be.
If we confess our sins He is faithful to answer us, forgive us, and He will make us new. I want so desperately to be new - particularly overnight if at all possible. An instant transformation of my character is preferred. And yet I have often heard the phrase of 'working out our Salvation', or the need to form character - something that is not deposited into ones self while sleeping.

I'm sorry. The Lord knows the depth of the sorrow I feel at the situations I have put myself in. But to you, the ones I have hurt I am so deeply sorry. I have never dealt with shame well, I hate feeling guilty. Especially when I can't fix it, and right now I can't. I don't deserve forgiveness - but I can't stay here alone, so I ask that you'd forgive me. I am wrong, have been wrong, and hope to be less wrong going forward. I will be brave through the power of His Spirit, I won't let the darkness envelope my soul because He dwells within me. I'm so sorry beloved, I will never be the same, please forgive me. 

Hope

In the midst of my short failings, and my large failings, of my complete decimation Jesus my Lord is faithful. One of my life verses have been Proverbs 13:12 "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life." Phil has seen me without hope, its a dark and scary place to reside. While we always have hope in Jesus, it is hard to imagine the intangible and He knows this. When He offers hope it is in part Him, His very existence offers us hope, but He understands our human frailty and often offers a tangible hope - a dream of the not yet. He offered hope this week. In typically me fashion I took that hope and began to make plans, figuring out logistics about to yell these plans from the rooftop. Until I was gently reminded by Phil, "God offered you hope. That doesn't mean that is what is going to happen, but He knew you needed hope and He gave it to you." How great is the Father's love for us! He knew I couldn't move, I was stagnate in this longing for hope - a future of longings fulfilled. While I hope that that specific hope comes to pass, I know that before it fails He will offer me another hope, and another, and another. He is an endless God, whose Spirit dwells within us offering comfort and hope regardless of man's logistics.

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So I rest on His peace.

"those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”


"He alone is my rock and my salvation, 

my fortress; I shall never be shaken."