I used to hear someone I knew say there was no point to regretting anything. Decisions are decisions, we can't change the past, so just move on. Attractive option. It's seductive in it's deceptive truth. How easy, how right it seems to move quickly to leave the past in the past and not turn around. Keep a straight and narrow path, sweep the pain, the hurt, the sin the lessons under the rug and move forward. Don't look down, don't look the right or the left, just keep moving forward. Let the tide of life pull you along until you can no longer see the shoreline, swept out to the next opportunity, the next moment that brings me nothing but pleasure and peace. Everything in between in just holding my breath until the right moment to exhale. Life's too short right?
I would love to be able to live life that way and envy those that do. How sweet it must be to never have to look back, take stock and take responsibility for the next decision, for the next moment, for the path they choose. The path would be so much easier. I would never have to feel the pain of loss, the regret of mistakes the haunting's of watching my actions have reactions and consequences. I would never have to feel rejection, knowing there was no point to anything besides finding the next happy moment. Eat and drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die, right? A life lived on the surface, moving down the lazy river of today. Accountability is moot point, life easily moving in and out of rhythm, nothing really ever mattering enough to sacrifice for, to change for, to believe in. But then again, nothing really to lose, nothing really to fail at.
I wish I had that luxury. Somewhere in the cosmic tying together of the knots in my brain, God forgot to give me the "easy come, easy go" gene.
Every morning I wake up, stare across the wall at the verses I have painted there; Romans 8:38&39, For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Isaiah 49:14-16, But Zion said, "The Lord has forsaken me, and the Lord has forgotten me." "Can a woman forget her nursing child, and have no compassion the son of her womb? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you. Behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me." Hosea 6:1-3, Come, let us return to the Lord. For He has forn us, but He will bandage us. He will revive us after two days; He will raise us up on the third day that we may live before Him. So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like rain; like the spring rain watering the earth. \ Psalms 91:14-16, "Because he loves me," says the Lord, "I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call upon me and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honor him. With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation." There is also a quote from Brennen Manning: "The dogged fidelity of Jesus in the face of our indifference to his affection and our own rampant ingratitude for his faithfulness - he is always faithful for he cannot disown his own self - is a mystery of such mind-bending magnitude that the intellect buckles and theology bows in its presence. Humbly acknowledging our limitations, we are driven to the fervent prayer, 'Lord I do believe! Help my lack of trust!'"
These verses, this sort of love, this sort of faithfulness, sacrifice and affection begs a reaction. It calls me to a place where I can't be satisfied letting life happen. I am called to account because of a love I did not ask for, yet found it's way to me. The very breath I am given asks me what am I going to do with this knowledge, this awareness I have. I wish I had the option of blindly turning an eye and walking away, letting indifference reign supreme, turning off the floodgates of emotions that bring me the same joy as they do the deep pain. I wish I could ease off the handle, walking away from that which I can't change, that which I regret, or even that which I miss, the opportunities missed, the love lost, the mistakes made.
But if I were able, if I could choose to do that so easily, how would I ever change? How would I ever grow, learn and develop into a person of character? If my heart can't break over my actions, over the actions of others, if I can't feel the pain I have caused, or the pain caused me, why would I ever need a Savior, a Redeemer, or even to just stop doing stupid things? Where would intimacy be? Where would hope, faith or love be?
I don't love for my sake, I don't have faith for my sake and I don't hope foolishly. I do these things because they are true. I choose them everyday because they are what life means. If I give them up, if I for a moment believe that the world is based soley on me and making myself happy, than there is no purpose. There is no reason to be anything besides selfish every moment, except when it suits me to be any sort of good and then it becomes another game of manipulation with every person I meet. How good to have to be to maintain your love, your acceptance, your good faith? How long will you believe the game I play?
That's why rejection hurts so much, isn't? It's someone I love telling me they don't believe me anymore. They don't want what I'm selling, and who could blame them? Most of the time we are choosing to love for the purely selfish reason of getting in return. And when that stops working, well then, why not just walk away? If what I am in the middle of, be it a friendship, a love relationship, a job, a community, stops offering me what I came looking for, than walking away is a good answer. No regrets, no need to have any.
This great love story though, this great cosmic truth stops that logic cold. No longer do I get to live for myself. No longer does it get to be about the injustices handed my way. I have to make choices, I am accountable now... I'm aware. A whole new level is reached. Down past the superficial, I have to make a choice, who am I going to serve?
If I make the choice to serve Him, admitting to every wound, every hurt I have, acknowledging the sin of my own hands, the evil I can bring, becomes paramount. The heart is now engaged and I no longer have the escape hatch of walking away... because of His faithfulness, I will never know rest until I have fought my demons. Nothing stays buried long and everything that is hidden will be brought to light. I have to stop, turn around, see the consequences of mine and others actions and fall to my knees begging for a forgiveness that covers a multitude of sins. Now, now I have to have faith. Not because faith has come easy, but because it's the only other option to insanity.
Everyday the sun will rise, the moon will fall and the earth will spin again. Life will happen, babies will be born, someone will die, somewhere. It's inevitable. And I could sit here, living in my parents home, letting life happen to me, watching and waiting for the next good thing to come along and ride the wave until another comes along. How is that honoring Him though? I can't honor the love the Lord has shown me, without engaging my heart. I can't love Him in return if I shut myself down to everything besides happiness, peace and comfort. I can't grow if I run from the regrets of my actions, the regrets of others actions. I can't love Him, trust Him, know Him if I am not honest with Him, with myself and with others, acknowledging at once the pain of my mistakes the pain of the mistakes of others in my life. I can't forgive without being forgiven and I can't forgive without opening myself up to the forgiveness that is needed when someone has hurt me. Starting there though, usually means feeling and that is hard. It's feeling the loneliness of rejection when my actions deserved it. It means feeling the pain of the rejection, deciding to forgive myself and others, desiring to change, to grow, to learn to try again. I can't run from every relationship and sabotage them when they get hard because I'm afraid, I can't run from making mistakes, from the inevitable pain that will come when I fail, or someone fails me. No one leaves this life unscathed or unmarred. No one leaves this life without scathing or marring someone else. A wounded heart is able to see it, understand it, break for it and be cleansed of it.
Artificial happiness is no happiness at all, it's numbness with a smile. It's apathy with a Bible in hand. It will only lead to less and less of a heart, slowly eaten away by pain unacknowledged in a wake of destruction, leaving others wounded behind. That's not the call, that's not the hope. That's the easy deception of a smart enemy.
Thomas Wilder said "In Love's service, only wounded soldiers can serve." On the battle-field, in the kingdom, or in our relationships, if I don't admit to what is happening in my heart, it can never be open to others and if I don't open it to the Lord and others, I am unsalty salt, or a lamp under the bed. I have lost my reason, my purpose and my place in His body. I have lost myself and He has lost me.
Faith is believing He is there, hope is knowing what I'm going through now has a purpose. Faith says I believe you, hope says I trust you. Once I do that with Him, once I reach an open intimacy with Him, I can now be cleansed, sealed and healed enough to share that same intimacy with others. The beauty is, in that moment because I have received the love I need so much, when I share with others, when I am open with them, it is no longer about getting my jollies off at them thinking I am something special, it can now be about truly loving them, even when they spit on me. It's no longer about my mask, that's gone, now it's about His face, not any of mine. Now I get to be counted as one of the soldiers on the battlefield, living out the orders of the commander, trusting He sees a larger battle plan. I can be openly sacrificed knowing I have a healer, knowing my wounds have a purpose beyond just my suffering. I can sacrifice the idol of my own need and lose myself into a will larger than mine. I can let myself die knowing with every last breath, I breath Someone else. Every time my heart breaks, it is another moment to turn, see His face, know His love, be taken back in, then sent back out knowing how to love another better.
It all starts in me though, with my wounds, with my heart, with my hurts, my sins, my regrets. I don't get the luxury of blinders to my own backyard. I only get the blinders when I am following orders. Faith and hope are for what we can't see, but wisdom is for what we can see. I am responsible for what I can control, me. The rest is faith and hope dedicated in trust to the sacrifice that at once woke me from my sleep and now calls me to account.
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