"Just try harder next time."
"Maybe if this boy liked you, you would be beautiful."
"Maybe if you were thinner, then..."
"Why can't you be like that girl over there..."
Maybe if they thought your voice was lovely, you would be..."
"Why can't you get this right, girl?"
"Maybe if you do this, you will be good enough."
Perfectionism
Legalism
Discontentment
Unthankfulness
Bitterness
Selfishness
Pride
Idolatry
Unbelief
The endless song of "never enough"
These are the roots in my heart that I had. Around these roots, I built a large wall and impenetrable fortress of pious "try harder."
And trying harder will never be enough.
The more I tried, the quicker I see and feel that my "trying" is missing the mark, monumentally. And the more I try, the more despair and anxiety I feel. Sometimes it causes me to retreat with great and loud bitterness and self-pity and sometimes to retreat into quiet robotic obedience which has joylessness and resigned despondency dangerously looming under the surface.
Because the illuminating questions that expose the darkness and blackness that lay underneath are:
"Will you love Me and follow Me, even if you never receive what you are begging Me for?
If they never love you,
if I have a life of suffering for you,
if they only draw near when they need someone to listen to their pain and forget you in the fun and carefree times...
will you love and follow Me?
Will I be enough for you?"
And when I faced these questions recently, I was horrified to see that answer was no.
"Kaitlyn, you are too hard on yourself."
"Kaitlyn, look at your worth in Christ!"
"What you want will come if you give it to Him and then, He will give it back..."
These are well-intentioned and even loving efforts to console... except that they keep the focus on me. They feed my self focus and my legalistic "elder brother" mentality of worshiping the Giver in order to receive His gifts.
Because they don't face the truth that He is what we need and that I am idolatrously chasing after other things to fill only what He can fill and heal. It's not even about the healing and filling as much as knowing and glorifying Him. And I'm still so very tempted to believe it.
About a year ago, I was torn in half, grasping at what I wanted and trying to fill my heart with a good thing, but when even the best of things that I pursue are all about me, praise the Lord that they leave me empty, because they aren't about Him. Instead it all left me more broken and torn. And even when walking away, saying, "I can't do this. I can't continue. I need to follow the Lord even if it means I never get what I want. Even if my heart is always broken."
I said those things and I meant them. But, I didn't think that almost a year later, that I would still feel this way. Because deep down, I didn't want to fully surrender them. I thought giving them to the Giver would mean that I would somehow have "earned the right" to get them back. What a divided heart that has revealed.
Because, as the past few weeks have revealed, the idol that I worship is me. It's my emotions and my thoughts and my desires and my perception of the Word.
Oh, what pride.
How ugly.
How divisive.
It puts me directly in us vs. them and most importantly, it takes my focus off of the Savior and puts it on me.
In the middle of June, "Jude" by Psallos was released and I listened to it on repeat for several weeks. What comfort and conviction wrapped up in a beautiful art rock opera of solid truth. Towards the beginning and towards the end of this lovely musical ciasim was the phrase: "we wondered, at times, if God was able to keep us... or would He lose us?"
Yes. I wonder that, too, sometimes.
And in my heart also the questions: "or would I turn away? Would I keep going? Would God be able to keep me even when I don't want to keep going?"
Then, about a month after I started listening to "Jude," I devoured Tim Keller's "The Prodigal God" for the first time. I vaguely remember the story from a video series shown in chapel in high school, but remnants have come back to me as I reread the story for myself.
It was over the weekend in July that we had lost our precious "Mimi," the grandmother and matriarch of our church, Cornerstone. When I joined the Nettles' small group during my freshman year of college at Union in 2011, I met Mimi and saw the Lord's amazing work of holding her fast in the turmoil of much suffering, walking alongside others and persevering hard work. She poured out her life without a complaint. In fact, usually she was playing down whatever she was going through and you could always count on her to call you a "sweet, sweet" and "precious, precious" child of God with great fervor as she exhorted you to hold to the truth of the Word.
The weekend she passed away, my heart was heavy and at a point where some of the desperation was surfacing as I would curl up in bed and sob until I fell asleep. Conviction, as I read "The Prodigal God," cut through this heaviness like an icy splash of water. Some of the groundwork of conviction from "Jude" was being furrowed, and my heart was exposed: I most certainly was the "elder brother" in this parable of two lost sons.
And now, Mimi's life, a stark testimony of a heart transformed and pouring out even when bleeding, because of the "yet not I but for Jesus" grace and mercy that had changed her heart. It wasn't her. It was Christ in her, just as she had always told us!!! Oh, how we miss her!
But, I will never forget: "I just wanna go home to be with Jesus."
That's what she kept saying the last time I saw her and I had no words.
And now, I keep thinking, "Lord, it was You. It was all You. Make me want to see You as much as You made her want to see You. It was Your love. Transform us. Show us. Teach us to love You and Your Word."
Yesterday, I just finished reading, "The Promise is His Presence" by Glenna Marshall. (It may seem as though I keep hopping all over the place, but this does all go together... Thanks for your patience!)
I was part of the launch team for this book, so I have been reading it over the past month and its release was August 1. And it stripped down my facade to its heart and the roots even more. It's a reminder and beautifully shows us that the whole point is that JESUS is the promise! The promise of God that we are trying to figure out and we are all waiting for! That God is WITH us! It's not health, wealth, prosperity, healing, happiness (though, those are not bad things to pray and hope for) but the lack of them doesn't mean that God is not good or that His promises are not true- but rather, He is always with us and purposing all things for our good and His glory the whole time. We can't always know what He is doing but we get to know Him. And He is good and He is enough. And that will be enough.
And that's what I saw in Mimi. What we all saw in Mimi. Throughout her life and at the end of it, she was overflowing with it: the promise is Jesus, and boy, did she rest in that. The gospel is what gave her joy and it's what caused her to press on and pour out. And it wasn't her, it was all Him. And He is still here, even though we miss her, and she is with Him more fully, and we will one day, too.
Praise the Lord.
Because of Jesus.
Those things I listed that were deep in my heart?
They still are.
But, I'm not pretending that they aren't anymore.
And, I pray that the Lord will not let me rest with them remaining there.
Because it's not about me- it's about Him!
"He has promised throughout all of Scripture that He will be with His people. We can trust that, since He has kept that promise for all of history, He will continue to keep it until we see Him face-to-face in Heaven. If death couldn't hold Jesus in the ground, then no circumstance on earth will keep us from the nearness of God. He will never leave or forsake us."
-from "The Promise is His Presence" by Glenna Marshall
As I answered the illuminating questions with a "no," I felt the Lord say back, "I know. That's the point. You can't. Only I can." And, so I am learning to relax into His truth and His will and His presence. Because that's what causes the younger brother to return home and what can cause the elder brother to rejoice at his return! Most glorious of all, it's what causes the Father to welcome them to be with Him. Because we are entering into His rest- and His rest is His Presence. And that is what turns our "why, God?" into "what are You teaching me, God?"
"Mercy and forgiveness must be free and unmerited to the wrongdoer. If the wrongdoer has to do something to merit it, then it isn't mercy, but forgiveness always comes at a cost to the one granting the forgiveness."
- from "The Prodigal God" by Tim Keller
“We wondered at times if God was able to keep us…or would he lose us.”
When dangers creep beneath you,
Like hidden reefs below,
When wandering stars above don’t lead you home,
When people promise blessing,
Like clouds that promise rain—
These pretty lying mists, they wisp in vain—
When wild waves surround you,
With vile, wicked shame,
When trees in which you trusted
Bear no fruit and give no gain.
Can he keep his sheep from stumbling?
Can he keep his children safe?
Can he keep his chosen people free from guilt and blame?
Can he keep his beloved without blemish, spot, or stain?
Now to him, the Lord our God,
He is able to keep you,
Able to keep you.
Our sov’reign King, our mighty Savior,
He is able to keep your soul!
May all glory and majesty,
Dominion and authority
Be yours, forevermore!
Through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen."
-17. the keeper (24-25) from "Jude" by Psallos
Click here to listen to "Jude" by Psallos
Click here to check out "The Prodigal God" by Timothy Keller
Click here to check out "The Promise is His Presence" by Glenna Marshall
