Just fast-forward!
Forgiveness is a strange word. Forgiving others, that is really difficult at times. But forgiving myself? Forget about it.
I often go down the same road of my past...my very checkered past. Some memory will come to mind, along with a sting of pain and the same question, "Wow God. How can you forgive me? How can you love me after all that?" I also wonder how I can be blessed with all the things He has given me, like going to CIU- a last minute miracle. How he has put Daniel in my life who patiently has waited for years for the "right" girl and I wonder, how on earth that can be me?! Or my older sister, whom despite my apathy and coldness over the years, never gave up having a relationship with me and wanting to be close.
None of us deserve the grace and blessings God gives us. I get that. But I guess I feel I especially don't. I don't get how after who I have been and what I have done, while knowing Him, I am still considered His child and still loved by Him.
But maybe His perspective is just different. We tend to dig up our past and spend hours crying at the grave of things lost due to our sin, and I guess we assume God is right there with us, sternly shaking His head. But maybe not. Maybe He just takes the bad because He knows the good is coming. Look at the stories in the Bible! Jesus knew Peter would deny Him three times and He still poured into him. He knew that there would come a day that Peter would be bold, bold unto death. God always knew David would be an adulterer and a murderer. But maybe during that time, He simply waited for the day David's heart would be broken and want forgiveness. I can hear the indignant angels, "Really God! You made him king! You have given him everything and look what he is doing?!" And God just raises his hand and says, "But remember when no one else would face the giant, but he did because he believed in me? Remember when he spared Saul's life three times for my sake? And look! Look what happens on December 17! He comes back! He starts over! He does right! See how much he loves me?!"
In the prodigal son, we do not hear the emotion of the father The story is told from the narrators perspective, so we do not know the internal agony the father must have experienced when his son wishes him dead by demanding his inheritance. I imagine that there were many nights the father wept, remembering his son as a small boy and when he would run to his father and jump in his arms and say, "I want to be just like you when I grow up." Though the story doesn't say, it implies that the father knew what his son was doing. Maybe he knew all along what his son was capable of. Maybe he had servants find out. Can you imagine the reports, "There were prostitutes seen entering his home." The grief his father must have felt, and yet he didn't give up. He kept waiting and watching for him to come back. And when he saw his son at last, he ran to him. The past didn't matter; all that mattered was his son's return.
I wonder, in those darkest moments of my life, when I was willfully sinning, when I was angry and defiant when I was living recklessly because I didn't know how else to cope with the chaos inside of me, if God simply told the angels, let's fast forward to the part where she comes back! Or let's put in the dvd of the time when she sang the song she made up about me when she was 7 years old. He knew, He has always known that the bad would not last.
It gives me hope to know that those shameful moments of my life are just flashes before my heavenly father. Moments He doesn't even remember. He is so much more concerned about the big picture, then the little details. And the big picture is, that I am His girl.
I often go down the same road of my past...my very checkered past. Some memory will come to mind, along with a sting of pain and the same question, "Wow God. How can you forgive me? How can you love me after all that?" I also wonder how I can be blessed with all the things He has given me, like going to CIU- a last minute miracle. How he has put Daniel in my life who patiently has waited for years for the "right" girl and I wonder, how on earth that can be me?! Or my older sister, whom despite my apathy and coldness over the years, never gave up having a relationship with me and wanting to be close.
None of us deserve the grace and blessings God gives us. I get that. But I guess I feel I especially don't. I don't get how after who I have been and what I have done, while knowing Him, I am still considered His child and still loved by Him.
But maybe His perspective is just different. We tend to dig up our past and spend hours crying at the grave of things lost due to our sin, and I guess we assume God is right there with us, sternly shaking His head. But maybe not. Maybe He just takes the bad because He knows the good is coming. Look at the stories in the Bible! Jesus knew Peter would deny Him three times and He still poured into him. He knew that there would come a day that Peter would be bold, bold unto death. God always knew David would be an adulterer and a murderer. But maybe during that time, He simply waited for the day David's heart would be broken and want forgiveness. I can hear the indignant angels, "Really God! You made him king! You have given him everything and look what he is doing?!" And God just raises his hand and says, "But remember when no one else would face the giant, but he did because he believed in me? Remember when he spared Saul's life three times for my sake? And look! Look what happens on December 17! He comes back! He starts over! He does right! See how much he loves me?!"
In the prodigal son, we do not hear the emotion of the father The story is told from the narrators perspective, so we do not know the internal agony the father must have experienced when his son wishes him dead by demanding his inheritance. I imagine that there were many nights the father wept, remembering his son as a small boy and when he would run to his father and jump in his arms and say, "I want to be just like you when I grow up." Though the story doesn't say, it implies that the father knew what his son was doing. Maybe he knew all along what his son was capable of. Maybe he had servants find out. Can you imagine the reports, "There were prostitutes seen entering his home." The grief his father must have felt, and yet he didn't give up. He kept waiting and watching for him to come back. And when he saw his son at last, he ran to him. The past didn't matter; all that mattered was his son's return.
I wonder, in those darkest moments of my life, when I was willfully sinning, when I was angry and defiant when I was living recklessly because I didn't know how else to cope with the chaos inside of me, if God simply told the angels, let's fast forward to the part where she comes back! Or let's put in the dvd of the time when she sang the song she made up about me when she was 7 years old. He knew, He has always known that the bad would not last.
It gives me hope to know that those shameful moments of my life are just flashes before my heavenly father. Moments He doesn't even remember. He is so much more concerned about the big picture, then the little details. And the big picture is, that I am His girl.
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