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Heart Update #1
>> Tuesday, October 5, 2010
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It is one of those times again; late at night when my heart is the fullest and my mind is spinning with the day and life in general.
It is generally at these times that I pull out a paper and pen or grab a good friend to chat with about God, life, love, truth, ideas, and the deeper facets of everyday living. It is on these papers and into these hearts that I share my deepest thoughts, desires and fears.
Over the last few months I have had the deepest walls of my heart penetrated, renovated, and my view point on several factors of life severely altered from what I originally had. God has taken my life, turned it upside down and I would say “Handed it back to me” but I don’t honestly think He has. There have been so many facets that He has touched but the one I really want to focus on this evening is Him. So grab a pillow and some coffee or chai (probably caffeinated) and make yourself comfortable. =)
I have always known that God was more than just a Deity that we worshiped and obeyed because if we did not, our destination was “HE-double hockey sticks”. I knew that it was a relationship with one person and one Savior that was a perfect beautiful combination of authority, God, man, lover, friend, strength, mercy, sin, forgiveness, love, hate, beauty, brokenness, passion, meekness, joy and tears. It is the epitome of every dream and desire; the ultimatum of the human existence.
Yet, I do not think I ever fully ‘realized’ the reality of Christ within myself in a way that affected every choice I made, from life alterations to the words that flowed out of my mouth on a daily basis and even more importantly so massively influenced and changed me just as who I am.
I have been reading a small beautifully written little theological book by a man named Myron S Augusburger – “Called to Maturity – Gods provision for Spiritual Growth”
When I first moved to WA I started attending a church down town and naturally made a bee line for the church library. Something, about the plain tan little hardback tucked away in a corner, caught my eye and I borrowed it for several months. Never once did I think it would change my life.
Now as I am still chipping away at this gorgeous little gem of literature, I am seeing God as so much more than I ever imagined. As an example, something I struggle with is forgiveness, not so much for people who have wronged me personally but those who have wronged someone I love. In many of my late night talks and writings forgiveness was a discussed topic because if it’s powerful necessity in our lives. I knew that we were called to forgive and that Christ forgave us, but I never understood so much of what Christ really did on the cross and just how much He Forgave nor HOW He did it.
To quote Augusburger, “To claim to forgive without assuming the consequence is not forgiveness but avoidance.”
That quote/thought set a little fire in my mind as I thought over all the people I need to forgive and all the times I have been forgiven, not only by human hearts but by God Himself who assumed the consequences of my sin in such a phenomenal sacrifice.
Augusburger put it this way: “ For Christ to truly forgive He would bear upon Himself vicariously the consequence of man’s sin. The Bible says “[He] bare our sins in His own body on the tree” it must here be recognized that the effect of being a sin offering as it rested upon Jesus was an impression upon His soul, not an experience within His soul of tasting sin. He never tasted Sin in personal transgression, but He gave His life, being “numbered with the transgressors.” In this experience of being a sin offering He looked into the cup and gazed upon the sin for the guilt of which He was dying. Every sin of humanity was in the cup He must drink: foul words, evil imaginations, malice, envy, hatred, lustful desires, immoral acts, deceit and pride; and all would be forgiven by the innocent Christ whose mind never tolerated evil thought, whose heart never beat with lustful desires, whose character was as pure as the driven snow, and whose heart overflowed with infinite Love even unto death”
Can you even imagine loving someone that much… I love and I love to love, but when I think about taking that sort of death, or any death for that matter, for the sin of mankind, knowing that I did not have to, it is honestly too much for me to even comprehend much less imagine doing! It brings me to my knees in speechless tears when I think of His Love, and how He loves us… how He loves me. ♥
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