Relief Without Redemption

 

It happens almost every Bible study, every coffee date, every time I write a blog that is quickly labeled “relatable.”

Someone is honest about their sin, someone bares their soul, someone opens up about something they’ve been hiding for years.

 And it is good.

It is good to be honest and it is good to let each other know that they are not alone. It is good that the norm in many churches is shifting from secret sins and plastic smiles to one of openness and honesty.

But I am beginning to wonder if we have made an idol of honesty and turned vulnerability into a virtue in and of itself.

We’ve bought the world’s weird lie about our “authentic selves” – that they’re not just worth uncovering, they’re good enough to live in.

Which is weird, because we know the truth about our “authentic selves” – they’re broken. They’re sinful and broken and corrupted by evil. And the benefit in baring them is to realize the depth of grace required and come to the foot of the cross once again.

I am done with cathartic soul-baring without any real redemption. I can’t just be honest about my failures. I have to let conviction set in.

Being vulnerable is not enough. I need to seek more than emotional tell-alls, I need to seek true and powerful conviction. I need to be receptive to getting called out, whether the Holy Spirit works directly in my heart or through the words of another.

In the name of “being real,” we’ve started holding up the grittiest testimonies and celebrating the best admissions of sin. It’s a competition to admit the worst thing, as if the one testimony we all share could somehow be outdone: I was dead, and now I am alive.

I’m all about celebrating the work God has done in broken people. But I fear we’ve made vulnerability an end goal, instead of a pathway towards reconciliation and redemption. It’s relief without redemption – I can enjoy the emotional high of sharing my struggles without getting my hands dirty. I can talk a big game without earnestly repenting.

Conviction isn’t comfortable, especially when it comes through someone else’s words. But it’s so important. Otherwise we’re just a bunch of sinners talking about what is holding us bondage, forgetting that we have been set free. He has given us freedom from sin, but if we keep admiring each other’s broken chains without stepping away from them, we won’t experience it in its fullness.

So I’m praying that I’ll confront my sins – not just that they would be revealed to me, but that I’d have the courage and conviction to get up out of my pit and take the hand of Jesus.

I can’t “fix” my sin, but I am refusing the grace of my Savior if I continue to trade in true conviction for cathartic “authenticity.”

 

 

I Want to Be Scared

Lord, get me out of the way.

I’ve been writing a lot about fear. But I’m realizing there are some things I might want to be a little more scared of.

I want to be a little scared I might not be doing this right.

No, I don’t want to live in fear and I don’t want to think it’s all up to me. I don’t want to buy into the prideful lie that I can mess with God’s plan or that He’s placing the burden of His work solely on my shoulders.

But I do want to be a little bit scared that I might be too selfish, that I might fill up on others’ affirmation, that I might have my heart set on the wrong things.

I want to be brave and I want to run headfirst into the things He is asking me to do. But I also want to be a little cautious anytime His plans might involve some spotlight. Because I’m selfish and prone to seek my own glory instead of His.

So there are some things I’m learning to be a little bit scared of. Is the terminology wrong? Maybe, I’m still figuring this out. But it’s the words I have right now for the feeling and concept and attitude I want to have.

Here’s the thing: I know how sin most often creeps into my life. It’s when I let the warm feeling of human approval and the sound of applause overshadow that still, small voice.

I want to be cautious whenever pride creeps in and I face the temptation to stop listening.

I don’t want the kind of brave that ever stops waiting for direction and wisdom.

I don’t want a bravery that rushes past patient and faithful and barrels straight into foolish.

I want to be a little scared – the kind of scared that recognizes my own limitations and sinful tendencies, not the scared that doubts the ability of my God to redeem and rescue and make all things new, including me.

Really, I just want to be scared that I’ll get in the way.

Again, is that the right word? I don’t know. Maybe wary or cautious or guarded is better. But there’s something powerful about admitting that for all my flag-waving against fear, there are some things a fragile little human like me needs to be scared of, and then ask her God to guard her heart against.

I want to be scared that I’ll start making followers of a God of my own making, not the God who was and is and is to come. I want to be scared that people will see me instead of Him.

I want to be guarded against accidental self-promotion and wary of the kind of wandering glory that could end up shining on me instead of Him.

I want to get out of the way. Lord, get me the heck out of your way.