Adopted

It is very difficult for me to express myself for what I'm feeling. I can talk about many other things very well. Things like what I should be feeling, what I have felt or what others are feeling. But expressing myself in the here and now doesn't always come easy. And that's because revealing my current feelings cuts away my veneer. If you know what I am currently feeling, you know that I am how I should feel and how I do feel are two very different things. I am trying to express these kind of things more clearly recently. And so I'm going to talk about something that I usually don't: my raw, current emotions. And in doing so maybe I can work through some of them and maybe even help some of you who feel similarly.

I don't know quite how to say this eloquently, but to be quite honest, I don't know that I like myself very much. Which I suppose makes sense. After all, I know myself better than (almost) anyone. I know about the failures that I hide from everyone else. I know who I am when no one is looking. I know the arrogant, duplicitous, depraved man that I am. And my struggle the past couple months has been finding a reason to dispute this view of myself. How can I love someone as totally destitute as myself? Why should I? When I look at myself in the mirror (metaphorical or physical) , I have a tendency to go straight to the negative. Part of that is human nature and I don't mean this in any sort of "attention seeking" way, but isn't that how we function as humans? Especially as Christians in an evangelical community, we tend to emphasize our depravity so much, that we hate every part of ourselves. Now, I believe in our sinful nature as much (or more) than the next guy. However, might we have thrown out the baby with the bathwater here? Paul never addresses the people he is writing as "the sinners" or "the depraved" or anything of the sort. Even at his most disappointed, he still refers to those in the Church as brothers--his own blood and family. I guess my point here is that if we only see ourselves in a "pre-Christ" light, we have totally glossed over the reason for our joy. Christ is not glorified by a group of people discussing how broken they are, no matter how "humble" they may seem. God is glorified when we say: "Yes, I was broken, in fact I was dead in my sin, but praise be to God, I am alive in Christ! I am a Saint! I am adopted into the family of Christ! I am a child of the Living King!"

I have approached these feelings of inadequacy from many different angles, and as I continue working through my thoughts, the best way I've found to express my thoughts is this: Love what Christ loves and hate what Christ hates. This is a way to safely align our passions in this life. What are things that Christ loves? The Trinity, his Word and the Church for starters. What are things that Christ hates? False humility (see the Pharisees), sin and people making a mockery of the Father (If we are being technical, all of those are sin, but you get the picture). Now, which of these categories do you and I fit into? One may say that we are sinners and should be hated by God, but beloved that is what we were, not what we are. We are now the Church, the Bride of Christ! Christ has paid for your sin, you no longer hold that weight on yourself! If Christ loves you, how can you tell him he is wrong to do so? Are you that naive? Are you that bold? Perhaps this is all coming off as obvious to some of you and many of you have heard these words time and time again. But how can we grow tired of hearing that we are forgiven and adopted into the family of God? Your self worth, my own self worth, is not found in my success, my appearance, my relationships, anything that I am so caught up in. My worth, my life, my all is in Christ. Everything else will fall short. And yea, I've gotten to that part of the post where I start rambling. I guess I'm preaching to myself again, but now you are all privy to that preaching. Oh well.

Oh, how sweet to trust in Jesus,
Just to trust His cleansing blood
And in simple faith to plunge me
'Neath the healing, cleansing flood!

Yes, 'tis sweet to trust in Jesus,
Just from sin and self to cease
Just from Jesus simply taking
Life and rest, and joy and peace.