Learning grace

After I found out about my father, I just kinda shook it off. I talked with a couple friends at the time, but I was in high school and I really didn't know how to deal with it or the feelings that the news had created. I remember telling my friend that I didn't know how to feel because even though it seemed like major life-changing news, it didn't change my life at all, so now what?

I went quite a few years telling myself I felt that way, but always secretly wondering so many things. A few months after my parents told me, I asked my mom some questions. What my biological father's name was, what he looked like, what he was like, where was he now, etc. The questions seemed to make my mother uneasy. She told me his first name but never told me his last. She said that he looked like Clint Eastwood when Clint Eastwood was younger and she said that she had a photograph of him and I, but had misplaced it. And then she told me that I had a dad and had no reason to want to know my biological father. After that conversation, I knew that it would hurt her and my dad if I brought up these questions any more, so I dismissed them and moved on.

But it has never left my thoughts for a single day. I just can't help but wonder so many things. I wonder if he's ever tried to find me. Or if he has children, do they know about me? I wonder why he never came back? I wonder if any of my kids look like him. I wonder if he is still living in Australia? Or New Zealand near his mother? Is she still alive? Does he love Jesus? Will I ever see him? It feels like a half of me is not there. Nothing is known about half of me. A mystery.

As I got a little older it started to become more and more real to me. More of something that kinda hurt my heart. I felt guilty for feeling that because there are so many children who don't have parents at all. I pray every day for God to be the one to fill that void. But for quite a few years I was not seeking God and in those years it really hurt that someone, my father, wanted nothing to do with me. It was hard for me to reconcile. It made me feel inferior somehow.

I have learned that people will always let us down. We are a lonely and selfish existence. There is nothing good in any of us and without God's hands around our hearts and His spirit in our lives, we are incapable of loving anyone or making any choices towards righteousness. It has made me look at people differently also. If they have not been filled with God's righteousness, then they are not capable of doing anything "good." Everything will be sinful, selfish and wrong. It is literally impossible apart from God. And so I am learning to forgive. And to pray for the people in my life who have hurt me. But it is hard...so very hard. Because I am still battling my flesh, still dying to self to live for Him. But the glimpses I get of His righteousness make me know that it is perfect. This grace that I have received is to be shared.

I forgive my father for leaving. I forgive him for rejecting me. I am so thankful that God has given me this grace and love to share and continue to pray that this work in me will be completed and that I may serve Him in every moment of my days.

Learning

Oh friends...

I am feeling. So much. I don't entirely know what or how to describe it. Just feeling. My heart feels open, hurting yet full and joyful at the same time. I truly don't know what is going on within but I can only guess that God is peeling back layers and continuing the work He has started in me. I wish I could trace this never ending journey back to a beginning. I cannot. There seem to be many beginnings to my story. And then, there's a big problem. It's not my story at all.

That's one thing that's happening. I am learning...really learning. So much. About God, myself, the Bible, my family, how this whole Christian thing is meant to work. Boy oh boy have I had it all wrong. This isn't my story, not even in the slightest. I am but a tiny excerpt in the greatest story ever told. The story written and told by the Almighty about the Magnificent. And I just a little bullet point, whose sole purpose is to exemplify to glory and grace of God. I suck at my job, might I add.

On any given day and time I am running from God, absorbed in self-righteousness, and shaming the grace that has been so abundantly poured out on me. And God knew that I would do that. And then He knew that after He showed me that I was doing that and gave me a spirit of grief for my sinful ways, that I would return and do it all again. He knew all that. And He still chose me. The King of the heavens and the earth, the creator of all things, scooped me out of the filth and pulled me to Himself. Before I even knew I wanted to be loved by the Almighty, He did. And then He put His love within me and spoke to me: Surrender. Everything, all you have and all you are. Because it is not me, friends. I am not good. Not even a tiny bit. Only Him in me is good and how can I but to throw my hands in the air and turn my face to the heavens and cry out in awe and worship...and offer everything?? I am trying. Well, I think I am trying. But we all know how that story goes. Only when I stop trying and just start letting God do it will I actually be giving of myself. Giving grace. And love and goodness from Him. Back to Him.

Oh what a relief it has been to realize that there is nothing I can do to pave the way for my salvation. Not a single thing. Just graciously thank Jesus for it. And live it. Live saved by grace.

That is mostly what I am learning friends. I have been a Christian all my life. Since I was five when I prayed that little prayer. But I never knew what that meant. I never knew that I was a Christian, not because of that prayer. Not because of any of my prayers. But only because I was chosen first. Sweet redemption. I am just learning what it truly means. And it is so sweet.