Thursday, November 18, 2010

Not Good Enough



~Tim Be Told, "Not Good Enough"

I stumbled upon this song a little while ago, and I wanted to share it ever since I heard it =].

As I'm sure all of you know about me, I'm a person who thinks a lot x]. For the past few weeks, what's been eating at my head was: what can I do to make God happy? Going through the Old Testament for my devos, I was amazed and fascinated by the laws God gave the Israelites and the very practical reasons why He commanded them. So, I felt motivated to try my best to honor God through obedience of His commandments. While I was trying to do this though, I got tripped up; I started criticizing and scrutinizing every detail of my day, wondering if any of it made God happy. While focusing on this, I lost sight of God's love for me and became concerned with whether I was good enough for God.

God sent me two things in this time that I really needed. One was talking with one of the upperclassmen in my fellowship, who challenged me to ask myself: "Am I trying to earn God's favor?" Before that, I don't think I realized that my accumulation of my actions was my attempt to try to earn God's favor for me. I knew the 'right answer,' which is that there's nothing I can do to make God love me more, and there's nothing I can do (or not do) that would make Him love me less. But somehow I had completely lost the beauty of this statement; that undeserved grace ultimately frees me from the weight of the law, because of Christ's finished work on the cross.

The other was my fellowship's at-church-retreat, the theme for which was "The Furious Love of God." The speaker opened up his message series with this question: "What do you think God thinks of you right now?" The speaker said that the most common response to this question is: "disappointed." the next was "angry," and the next "unconcerned." And I could definitely identify with feeling that God was perpetually disappointed in me, because I always fail to carry out what I want to do for Him. Throughout the rest of the retreat, I learned about how God's first forethought for me is not judgment or disappointment, but love. I think the greatest application challenge from that entire retreat was to simply accept God's amazing love for me.

During this retreat, I was reminded of how prone I am to turn to "moralism," which is trying to save myself or make myself favorable through my own righteousness. Alongside that, I was also reminded of God's amazing, unconditional love for me. I remember one night, after worship had ended, I laid back in a pew by myself and just pondered on that beautiful truth: "God's love for me is CONSTANT and UNCHANGING."

This song from Tim Be Told lays out all the expectations placed on a boy to be a man. And when it all comes down to it, by those measures, he is and feels as if he is not a man. All the "I should be's" collide with the "I'm not's." All those expectations to hold it all together...and in the end, "it's your fault anyways." And after the speaker's gathered all that he's done, all his trophies and achievements into his arms, he shows his dad, and all his dad can say, "where is the rest of it, son?" ...isn't is great to know that even though our parents might treat us this way, or we might treat ourselves, our Father and Creator doesn't look at us like this. It's awesome that He would even understand the pain and pressures and hardships of being human. But still then, He doesn't even look at how much we accumulated.. All He does is smiles, holds us, and says: "you're good enough."

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Hide


I think I'm really stressed out. And I'm really frustrated and full of jumbled emotions. I don't know what's causing them, probably college. And I don't want to trouble others either. I know they have their own problems too, and I don't want to trouble them. I feel as though I'm not going to others because I want to be the better person, and not appear to be like a selfish person. But I realize that sometimes, being selfish makes it okay for the other person to be selfish, lightening the burden for the other person. Anyways, I'm going to be selfish now...but it's ok. I want to be selfish around God. Because then, I would want and need his love more.

To anyone who hides behind a smile
To anyone who holds their pain inside
To anyone who thinks they're not good enough
To anyone who feels unworthy of love
To anyone who ever closed the door
Closed their eyes and locked themselves away

Chorus
You don't have to hide
You don't have to hide anymore
You don't have to face this on your own
You don't have to hide anymore

So come out, come out, come out wherever you are
To anyone who's tryin' to cover up their scars
To anyone who's ever made a big mistake
We've all been there, so don't be ashamed
Come out, come out and join the rest of us
You've been alone for way too long


And if you feel like no one understands
Come to the One with scars on His hands
'Cause He knows where you are, where you've been
His scars will heal you if you let Him

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Sticking With You


Dear God,
Lately I have been very overwhelmed by everything. I don't know how to manage the classes and I'm barely passing them. With college apps on top of that--I'm being crushed, well, I don't know if crushed is the right word, but, you speak the language of the heart, right? so, you know what I mean. I find myself by the end of the day, trying to avoid it all, giving excuses to not do them, to delay doing them. I wonder if I might have taken a bite too big for me to chew. I really want to give up, but the fact that I am still faced with these problems means you don't want me to. If I could just sleep it all away...
What do you intend for me to do? I'm so confused and lost. I'm in all directions. I'm so afraid that I am not following the path you want me to follow. What do you want with me? You still keep me here, fighting, and I'm fighting, but I don't know if I have much strength to. What have you planned for me? Ahh, that must be it, huh?
And this is the kind of God you are, huh? You don't give up on me, and you're so relentless! Don't you know what personal space is? Who asked you to come BARGING into my life? But I need you to barge into my life. Because from the looks of it, I obviously can't handle it on my own.
I hate that you're right and I'm wrong. I hate that everything you plan to happen ends up good but everything I plan ends up a mess, and I hate that you are always cleaning up the messes I make. And I hate that I'm having this stupid tantrum and acting like a child now.

God, promise to hold on to me and never let go.