"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast” Ephesians 2:8Words cannot express how much and how long I had wanted to believe the statement above. I had heard these words plenty of times, in many different ways and yet my heart had a difficult time accepting it. In my mind I understood the concept of grace- that it was a gift we didn’t deserve. But my heart was a different story. As you know, I had a very performance based mentality, and I continued to strive to be perfect on a daily basis. I strived to be a better wife, a loyal friend, the smartest worker. I wanted to impress friends around me by showing off how ‘perfect; our life was. But honestly… I felt very tired. It’s as if I was going a million miles an hour, trying to chase after something that always seemed to elude me.
Not only was I constantly striving, but I also passed judgment on others constantly. As much as I longed not to be judgmental, I couldn’t help it! It was as if it was ingrained in my DNA. I tried to shake it off, close my eyes, and think good thoughts, but my judgment was always there, day in and day out.
For a couple of years now, Steve and I have attended Celebrate Recovery at our church on Thursday nights. This is a 12-step Christ centered program to recover from any hurt, habit, or hang-up. Although Steve and I didn’t have the obvious addictions such as drinking, drugs, sexual, etc, we had plenty of other hurts to make up for it! We truly enjoyed attending this program as we enjoyed the fellowship and transparency of others. After all… ‘it is the best place to be on Thursday nights!’
During this program, we got to hear the testimonies of people who had been down at the bottom and brought back to life. These were people who battled drug addictions, alcoholism, sexual abuse, verbal abuse, etc. They had been hopeless and walked through the darkest valleys. But at the end of every testimony, they shared the joy of being brought back to life! Christ had entered their life at some point and restored their health, their mind, and their relationships. They were walking miracles and I was in awe to be around them. I know there was no possible way they could have done it on their own.
As I heard these testimonies I realized one thing for sure: These people knew the gift of ‘Grace’ in a way that I could not. I had lived somewhat of a ‘grey’ life, while these people had lived in ‘black’ and brought to ‘white’. Does that make sense? Nothing too horrible had happened to me, but nothing too miraculous either. I was in the midst of a mundane life and my constant striving to be a ‘good’ person did not allow me to rest in God’s grace. Now don't get me wrong, I am not saying that something horrible has to happen to you to have a real relationship with God. There are many women that I know that love and appreciate the Lord with all their hearts and have a pretty joyful life. I am just talking from my personal experience and how I felt. I saw in the people who had given these testimonies that they were 100% resting in God’s grace. They knew they had been given an undeserved gift by someone much bigger and larger than them.
But I on the other hand, somewhat felt I deserved at least some of the good things that had happened to me. Steve and I watched children on the nursery, tithed, led weekly bible studies, and looked forward to going to church on Sundays. Somehow ‘undeserved’ did not ring as true for me in my heart. I was slowly becoming self-righteous.
There is a parable in the bible which clearly explains why my gratitude was not as deep in my heart (I love how Jesus always spoke in parables for us to understand!!). The story is found in Luke 7:41-42. To give a little bit of background, Jesus had been invited to dinner by a Pharisee (probably a guy who followed the rules and did all the good works). When Jesus gets there, a very sinful woman comes to meet Him. She is in such thankfulness and awe of Jesus that she can do nothing else but cry and kiss his feet! Then the ‘pharisee’ starts talking bad about this woman to Jesus, politely letting him know she has done some very bad things. Jesus obviously already knew what this woman had done. Instead of turning on her, he turns to the Pharisee and tells him this parable:
"Two men owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon replied, "I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled."
"You have judged correctly," Jesus said.
This woman had been forgiven a lot, and so her gratitude was immensely great. In my past, I had been forgiven little and so my gratitude was much less than someone who had been forgiven more. If someone one day forgives our mortage debt of $200,000 dollars I will be forever thankful. But if someone else forgives me a debt of $5, I will probably not remember the following week!
I know grace in a much deeper level now. I am down at the bottom of the pit and things look pretty hopeless down here. I googled the word 'pit' to find a picture of what it would look like (above). But I have hope in a God much bigger than me who is the only one who can rescue me. Even at the bottom of my pit, I know I am pressing on only by grace, not by my own strength. If I ever make it out of here, you can be sure I will be 100% resting in God’s grace and not on my works anymore. They do not earn me any more favor or love from him. I will have as much love now as He will ever give me! And I can rest now when I fall short of my expectations, knowing that even if I am not perfect, He will still love me just as much.
After Andrew died, I kept trying to figure out what I had done to cause Andrew to die. Was this a punishment? Had I not prayed with the right heart? I examined myself (as you can see from my blog writing) and I found many things that weren’t pretty. But I realized two things for sure: 1. There was nothing I had done to deserve my son’s death any more than anyone else with a healthy baby. 2. There was nothing I had done or could ever do to deserve Andrew to live. He was purely a gift.
I know now that all I have- my health, my husband, my home, my food, my family, and friends- are all a gift from above. I don’t deserve any of these things any more than the person next to me. If everything good in my life comes from above, who am I to judge on why others are in the path they are on? I've started to appreciate life in a way that I couldn’t before. I would look at homeless people in the street, and would think to myself ‘how lucky are you to be walking and be breathing right now?’ how I longed for Andrew to have some of that health. I do appreciate the miracle of life in a different way now.
I love Grace. Grace allows me to finally rest! It allows me to enjoy life and stop striving for next best thing. Grace replaces judgment with a spirit of gratitude, because I know I have been given something I will never deserve. There is no greater joy than to be given a beautiful present without expectations or strings attached!
