The Art of Receiving

How fickle my soul and how woozy my eyes
I stuggle to find any truth in your lies
and now my heart stumbles on things I don't know
this weakness I feel I must finally show
- Mumford and Sons "Awake My Soul"

And I cannot decide where my heart will abide
Close to you is comfortable and safe...but just not right
- JJ Heller "The Last Time"


So again, a few weeks' time has passed between my posts, and I can't seem to feel guilty for it, though I admit I haven't tried much.  The past few weeks have been very revealing to me on the state of myself - my personality, my morality, my will, my spirituality...even my very soul.  I am a fickle creature.  I am selfish beyond all else.  I am prideful, I am spiteful, I am a liar.  I am so very human and so very sinful.


I've probably known these things for my whole life - in fact, I'm sure that I have.  I've never made light of the fact that I am human despite being a Christian.  I have never denied being a sinner or tried to make someone think that I was better than them (at least on purpose).  But in the last few weeks, I've come face-to-face, quite closely, I might add, with just how much I desire my sin.  For years, I've prayed (admittedly, half-heartedly) that God would teach me to hate my sin, that He would move in me to be inclined toward goodness, and not wrong, and I suppose, somewhere along the way, I stopped praying for what I considered an "imaginary fruit", something that would never come to fruition.

I've never been one for confession.  I guess I've always figured that because I tend to be judgmental of other Christians, everyone else is too, so why do they have to know what bad things I've done that I struggle to be sorry for?  However, I think God knew that about me, and brought me to the point that the sin that I should hate, the sin I've held to and felt comforted by (like the JJ Heller song above), shamed me.  It required confession - not only to God, but to another believer.  It required humbling myself to the body of Christ and receiving their wrath.  Except, when I went to do that, there was no wrath.  In response to my shamed confession, I received only grace.  In all honesty, I had no idea what to do with it.

It was a life changing experience in that I think, in the week(s) since that moment, I've learned to extend the same grace.  Not just in name, as I have before, but in practice.  I've forgiven more completely for things I'd already "forgiven" and done what I can to listen less judgmentally, and I'm very glad for that change.

However, sin isn't that easy.  It's not a once and done kind of experience, though I wish it was.  The grace that I received in response to my confession was a gift, and I am a selfish sinner.  I take my gifts and they're never enough.  In fact, even as I type this, I acknowledge that my sinful self takes the receipt of grace from a friend as a "get out of jail free" card - so I can go, sin again, and experience the absolution once more.

I know I'll need it.  I know I'll need to confess again.  But in the meantime, I'm still praying for God to help me hate my sin, because all I want to naturally do is exploit the grace I've been afforded, and that defeats the purpose, now doesn't it? 

Please....make this the last time.
So take my through this shadowland
I pray that you will hold my hand
and teach me to be who I am in You...
- JJ Heller "The Last Time"

Bind up these broken bones
Mercy bend and breathe me back to life
but not before You show me how to die...
- Audrey Assad "Show Me"