Authenticity.
People are always a little taken-aback when I say that. Why would that matter? Why would that be the most important word? Shouldn't it be something like love, or hope, or faith?
I contend that they are. They are some of the most important concepts, acts, reasons for living, but all of them, all of them are contingent on one thing: authenticity.
It is difficult to describe the ramifications of such a philosophy within my own life. It comes from a place of dissatisfaction, a place of frustration and conceptual need to understand and see the truth. I have watched many fall and waiver under the burden of words such as love, faith and hope when authenticity has been lost. All three become acts, ways of playing the game to get by. They become stones around the neck, drowning people in the "should's" or "should not's."
But the real reason authenticity has been such an obsession in my life is this: it allows for no excuses, no justifications, no imitations of anything other than deep relationship.
If loving people, if having faith, if hoping for something is the call of Christ, if loving Him and His bride is the most important thing we can do, then why would He ever not give us the tools to do just that in spirit and truth? I have heard love described as just an act, as a way of being, but doesn't that somehow take the power of it away? Who wants to be loved in an empty impersonal sort of way? Ask any husband or wife out there, would they rather their spouse do something out of duty, or genuine desire to care? No matter how much you try, you can't separate emotion from love, faith and hope.
That's not to say that emotions don't wax and wane, bringing about at times the need to push past the hurt, the anger, the pain, the whatever, to keep loving and keep having faith and hope, but nothing is 100%. There has to be a point where spirit and truth meet the heart place of real love.
We don't marry someone for contractual reasons, we don't enter into relationship because it's "right." Usually we fall in love, that love starts to grow and the rubber hits the road and out of that love has to bare the fruit of choice and struggle, yada, yada, yada. The point is, it start with a place of real love.
This is a round-about way of saying there is no need to settle. So often I have found myself or others struggling with the knowledge of what love and God are, trying to convince themselves that their heart is in the wrong place, so it needs to change. They ignore the bigger, harder questions they don't want to ask for whatever reason. They have met the Savior and now everything should be fine. They now have the Holy Spirit so everything should fall into place and they just need to act out love. There is a "right" thing to do, or believe, or think, or be and anything else is just wrong. The heart, the heart is completely ignored in favor of understanding or just not wanting to know what the answers to their questions are.
Admitting to the questions that come from pain, loss or bad choices is hard. But that's the only thing that breeds the authenticity. You can't ignore pain, hurt, questions, struggles and try to be just "be" or "love" or whatever, without eventually ending up exhausted and giving up. Without the heart connection between the love of the Father, the grace of the Father, the hope of the Father, actions just become servitude to an unseen distant Lord. It becomes duty rather than relationship.
It's hard, looking into His face and saying "I don't understand. My heart is not engaged, why? What do I need? Where are You? Help me receive this love so I can give it out. Show me grace so I can pass it along, fill me so I can fill others." It sounds like a challenge, a test somehow. It almost sounds dishonoring, or disrespectful. Think about it though, if He is the one that has charged us with the task of loving "in spirit and truth" if He is the one that says to love Him and others is the greatest commandment, if He is the one that says He is love, passionate, true, unending love, than why would it ever be disrespectful to ask Him to give you what you need to do just that? If He is not scared of the questions, the emotions, the struggle, than why should I be?
Asking the questions though, facing the ineptitude of our struggle, giving Him space to move in, heal, complete the good work, give us strength that isn't our own, peace that surpasses our understanding, those, those are things that have to come out of real relationship, and real relationship can't exist without communication. It can't exist without asking the hard questions, saying the hard things, telling the other when you are mad, hurt, frustrated or just plain confused.
The best times in my life have come when I have not excused, buried or ignored the questions, pain, anger, but instead have taken them to His feet, dropped them and said "So what do You think about that, huh? Explain this one to me." The only caveat being, I had to stick around long enough to hear His answer. I had to believe that if He was as good as He says, if He loves me as much as He says He does, if He really does desire me the way He says, than asking the questions, they would eventually lead to answers, healing, or just a peace that would lead me closer and closer to Him. I had to start by believing what He said over the fear, the pain and the hurt. I had to desire to connect, reconnect, or just believe that connecting with Him was what the real goal was. He had to be able to get to my heart in ways I didn't understand. I just knew my part was to show up and start the conversation. The end result was up to him.
More and more I have been learning how true that story is for relationships as well. You can start with an amazing connection, with real love, with beauty and trust and all of foundations that can lead to a deep meaningful relationship, but without the ability to show up, ask the hard questions and deal with pain, fear and anger, authenticity and desire begin to fall apart. Hurts happen, people say stupid things, do stupid things and make us angry, eating away at the genuine love and easy connection. It's normal, it's part of the journey, but if you can't return, go back, deal with it and find resolution, the walls between you and the other get thicker, taller and harder to get past. We bury things, try to "let things go" or just don't say what we need to, and all that's left is duty. It becomes empty acts of "love" that don't feed into a deeper more meaningful connection. We stop seeing the other person for who they really are and we see them only through a haze of hurt, anger and fear. All of the bad piles up and then, one day, it's no longer worth it. The fight is pointless and what we once had dims so much we forget what we once fell in love with.
The fight, the pursuit, the struggle comes in not letting that dim. It comes in the form of saying "No I won't settle for this and I believe there has to be more. I'm not going to excuse everything away, or not talk about it, because if I do, I will lose this intimacy, this connection, I will forget who you are and I can't stand that thought. Talk with me, answer my questions, help me see and ask for my forgiveness, change, mold, work with me please as I will with you as we fight to protect this beautiful thing that has started."
It is no different for our relationship with the Lord as it is for our relationship with others. Going deeper, sticking around, fighting through can look like trusting the others heart more than the fear, the pain, the hurt, the restlessness. It says you won't believe in anything besides true love, faith and hope. It says you know there has to be more and you aren't going to settle for anything less. There has to be the possibility of healing, redemption, repair, hope in despair and more than just feeling like a hamster spinning in a cage.
There has to be the possibility of authenticity. Of meaning what you do more than just the actions, of meaning with all your heart the words you say. There has to be the ability for them all to meet and be real, true and fulfilling.
It all has to start with a choice though. It has to start with the belief in the heart of God and His desires for us, because if they are true, than no question asked can't be answered, no hurt can't be healed, no anger can't be released, no forgiveness can't be granted. Life can be fully about redemption, hope, faith and love... authentically.
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