Monday, January 15, 2018

Humiliation and Holiness

Have you ever had a time in your life where so much was happening internally that you simply couldn't give it proper voice? And if you were asked the question "what's been going on" by someone you hadn't talked to in a while, you would either respond with a two hour download of every single thing, or (much more likely) you would look at them with your head very near to overheating, and say "I can't talk about it. It's too much."

That is how the last several month have been for me.

I've been asked a few times why I haven't been blogging, and my response has been, every time, "Because I can't give it all words. There's not enough space on my laptop, or in my head, for everything. It's all just too much."

There has been the forward march of time, and all the physical things that come with it. My 15 year old daughter started driver's education (dear God, help me) and will hopefully have her permit by the end of this week.

My 13 year old son became too tall for me to rest my chin on top of his head when he hugs me. (Not that he hugs me very often...or ever without proper incentive...incentive like he wants to go to a friend's house or play a video game or eat some of my remaining Christmas candy or is trying to get out of trouble for calling me old or uncool.)

The 10 and 7 year-old boys continue to make my life a crazy conglomeration of hilarity.

All around me, externally, things change, as they always do, but to me it seems that all of it is the same, exactly the same, compared to the changes going on in my heart.

I can't explain it all. It would take forever. It would overheat my laptop, my brain, and the whole WORLD.

I have gone through, and am continuing to go through, a rather miraculous awakening in my spirit.

And rather than try and tell you all about it, I have finally decided to take a minute and tell you why it started. Not because this story speaks highly of me at all, but because this awakening is so all consuming to my very BONES that I want all the people I come in contact with to want it too.

It started with humiliation.

I'm totally serious.

It began with a conversation with someone, someone who pointed out to me, clearly and boldly, an area in which I was really screwing up.

The inner shriveling of my pride had to be externally visible, I swear.

It stings a lot more than we care to admit, having our faults and failures pointed out to us. Sometimes people aren't even aware of how much we feel like we've just been punched in the throat by their words. That was certainly the case for me. I swallowed and I blinked and I nodded and I cleared my throat and I took the reproof...and then I HOBBLED away, not wanting it to be known that I had just had my legs all but cut from my body.

I sat with that sting for a solid day, quietly mulling it over.

And then...then I told someone else about it.

"Yesterday someone said something to me and its sitting inside me like a weight. I need to confess this ugliness to someone." And so I did. And it felt like I was talking with KNIVES in my throat.

It is HARD for me to admit when I am wrong. I don't like to be weak. I don't want to be a failure.

And that is what started it all.

Because after that, a slow, steady pattern began to emerge. I would be going about my life as normally as anyone with a house full of wild kids and a life full of activities can, and suddenly, a person, or in several cases, the voice of the Lord in my heart, would directly shine light on a fault, flaw, sin, error, weakness, etc. in my life.

R. U. D. E.

At first I was getting pretty pissed off. "Come ON, I know I'm not perfect or even close to it, but I am tired of getting picked on."

But, something else began to happen at the same time. That first humiliation that led to confession and prayer and forgiveness and heart change...that area of my life had altered so dramatically and noticeably that I felt THANKFUL for that moment of utter, breathlessly horrifying rebuke.

And as I realized that it had been a good thing to have my failure pointed out to me, and an even better thing to confess the failure to someone else...a change took place (and continues to take place) in my heart.

"Search me, O God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out any offensive way in me, and lead me along the path of everlasting life." Psalm 139:23-24

This verse has become a constant prayer in me. And BOY has God been pointing out the offensive ways in me. Sometimes through people, more often through His Word and His voice.

And, if I'm brutally honest, I am always relieved it is just the Lord who is fussing at me, and people don't know my junk...until the Lord follows up His gentle reprimand with a reminder of this verse: "Therefore, confess your sin to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed."(James 5:16)

R. U. D. E.

And, lest you feel this is a blog post about how I have arrived at...anywhere...its not.

I am just walking the path...

And the Lord continues to point out offensive ways in me...and you know what else is happening, as I repent of my sin and confess it and get prayer and am delivered?

I am hearing His voice more clearly than I ever have before.

He prompts me to be obedient, and then, as I am, I see Him in a whole new, miraculous light. And when I fail to be obedient, He is gentle in His reprimand...and I repent again, and somehow, in His great mercy, He leads me further along the path of everlasting life.

I feel like this is a vague, detail-deficient explanation of the total heart transformation I am currently undergoing...but maybe that's the point.

My details wouldn't be the same as yours, and probably wouldn't resonate with you. If you want to hear specifics, ask me. I will share them. I will tell you my failures. Even though I'll be pushing out the words around metaphorical throat-knives.

I am eager to receive reproof (or at least I want to be), and I desire to practice humiliation, because I HAVE SEEN AND AM SEEING THE EVIDENCE of those things working in my life for my good!

Being rebuked is horrible. Confessing sin is humiliating.

We run away from it. We fake our spiritual status in order to avoid it. We pretend our failures aren't really there. And when we can't pretend, we make excuses for them, or justify them.

Y'all. We are missing out on more of the Lord when we do these things.

WE ARE MISSING OUT ON MORE.

"He forever made perfect those who are BEING MADE HOLY" (Hebrews 10:14)

 And that's what I wanted to share from the past several months of my journey. I don't want to miss what He has for me next. He sees me as perfect because of His Son's blood, and He's making me holy, through the work of the Spirit in my heart. It's an ongoing process. Its a path.

You don't want to miss what He has for you. And, terror-inducing as it may be, a journey toward holiness is often on the other side of a little humiliation.

More and more, Lord. Lead me along the path of everlasting life. Make me holy, for Your glory.

Humiliation and all.

2 comments:

Athens

"People of Athens, I see that you are very religious in every way, for as I was walking along I saw your many shrines. And one of your ...