You are Loved

One week ago I was at the end of myself. My self-loathing was high and I felt hopeless. I lay in bed Saturday night and talked to God about it. Essentially the conversation was, Lord, you gave me this wonderful body and I have not taken care of it. I have broken it. And no matter how many times I swear I’m going to do better, in my own strength I cannot change. I’ve tried and failed so many times I’ve lost count. I can not fix this in my own strength. And as I lay there, exposing my sin to God, I just wanted him to do something. Yell at me. Tell me how disappointed you are in me, agree that I’ve really messed things up. Punish me. Anything. Just do anything to get me out of this horrible place of stuckness and failure. As I lay there I was exhausted and feeling so low. I started to drift off to sleep and there was a whisper in my mind, “You are Loved” and a peace came over me and I fell asleep. In the morning, those words came right back to me and I repeated them over and over again in my head as I got ready to head to church. Maybe there would be some answers for me in the service.

We had a guest speaker, Clem Ferris, and his sermon had me sitting on the edge of my seat, as it felt like God was speaking directly to me through his words. He was talking about grace. And there were two things he said that have stuck with me all week. First, he told a story about how his dad let him “drive the car” when he was seven. He sat on his dad’s lap, held the steering wheel and “drove” the car into the garage from the driveway. He was so excited about his big accomplishment. But the truth was, his Dad had his hand firmly on the bottom of the steering wheel and it had been his father who actually drove the car. He pointed out that our sanctification is like that. We think that we are doing everything in our own strength, but God is the one that is making the changes in us, it’s his strength that accomplishes things in our lives, not our own. Second, he told about how his perspective changed on the story in the Bible where a woman caught in adultery is brought before Jesus. The crowd is ready to stone her and Jesus says, whoever has never stoned, throw the first stone. The crowd slowly leaves without throwing any stones. Jesus asks the woman where her accusers are, didn’t even one of them condemn you? She says no and he says, Neither do I, go and sin no more. Clem said that his interpretation before used to be, Jesus not condemning her was grace. And then of course, she needed to go and work hard at not sinning any more. But now, his view was, Jesus didn’t condemn her because of the work he was about to do on the cross which would cover all of her sins. The grace in the story was telling her to go and sin no more. That is something that is accomplished with the help of the Holy Spirit. God doing the work in us. After the sermon, our church always has a prayer team at the front of the church so you can get special prayer for whatever you need. As the service was over and people were starting to stand up to leave, one of the pastors reminded everyone about the prayer team and said they felt like there was a special call for those who were needing freedom. I went up. And was met by two dear ladies that I know and I trust. I talked to them about my inability and seeming undesire to care for my body in the way that I know I should and my inability to fix the problem. They prayed over me. And while I can’t remember all that they said, the theme was love. You are loved. There is no condemnation. God is the one steering the boat, not you. I went home and ended up having most of the day to myself as my family scattered all over the place. I took a really long walk, thinking about the sermon. I went to bed several hours earlier than normal and slept a lot. In the morning, I was still thinking. I ate my normal, not so great for me, bowl of cereal. Not sure what to do now. And then somewhere around lunch time I felt a surge of hope and suddenly had a plan.

Two years ago, when I had been working really hard to get healthy again, I had used a personal trainer app where a personal trainer gives you a workout to do every day and you record everything you eat on the app and the trainer is available to give dietary advice. I still had the contact info for my old trainer and I texted her, telling her I’d like to get started again. Within half an hour I was all signed up and already had a workout assigned to me. I went ahead and did it. Then I decided I might as well record what I was eating, so I put my info in, then I decided that I should probably start checking my blood sugar with my glucometer (something my doctor told me to do but I’ve been avoiding for over half a year) and I might as well record my numbers on the fitness app so my trainer could help keep me accountable. So I did that. Which was an unpleasant reality check, but it was also motivating. Ok. What can I change so I can get those numbers lower? In the past week I have been exercising a lot, made major changes in my diet, and I’m already seeing improvement in my blood sugar numbers. I have been filled with hope and peace and I haven’t felt once like cheating or stopping. And that is a miracle. A week ago I truly felt dead in my sins, completely unable to help myself. And today I feel alive in Christ, set free from bondage.

I think the takeaway point I want to make is that this has come about from a fresh revelation of God’s love for me. His love for me now, as a broken person who doesn’t have the strength to help herself. Not as a perfect person who is doing everything right. There are two things I’ve been repeating to myself all week. You are loved. And Jesus is the one driving the car, not you.