Amazing Grace

There is a reason people aren't authentic...nobody wants to know you. not really. Not if you are messy. They don't want to hear what keeps you awake at night or makes you sob uncontrollably. We're uncomfortable with being uncomfortable and quite frankly, frankness is uncomfortable. Openess about our ugliness is a little too offensive, abrasive, and harsh. So, people are much more comfortable with who I pretend to be.

But, i must ask: if I am not as horrible as I think I am, why the cross? Seems a little harsh to punish one's own Son in such a brutal, barbaric way if the people He was supposedly "saving" were pretty decent to start with. And, if Jesus only did that so I could go to heaven, there could have been an easier way. Like a punch card. Do so many good deeds and earn your way to heaven.

I am so grateful that God is comfortable with me. Not the me left to myself, but the me He is redeeming. He wants me to see myself for who I really am, because, only in seeing my utter depravity does the cross begin to effect real change in my life. For a God who would reconcile Himself to me...the me I know...is a God of AMAZING GRACE. He's a God I want to serve and please and know.

We all shout: sinners saved by grace, but we don't shout about the sinners part too loudly. But I would suggest that, unless people see where we were...before God intervened...and where we are...still struggling to be who He called us to be...they can't connect with what God is doing in and through us. See, the grace in my life isn't nearly as amazing if you don't know the whole story...if you haven't heard about the me I was before that grace began to change me...about the me I still struggle to crucify so that I might live a life worthy of the call. That grace, the grace that stepped into my existance and had an impact beyond my wildest imagination, THAT GRACE is amazing.

So, I'm sorry that I have to admit I'm rebellious. That I stink at pleasing God. That when I compare the words of Jesus with the actions in my life, there is a vast disconnect. But, the grace that loves me despite that...that is some serious amazing grace.