The Truth about Me

Note: I hesitate to post this because I don't want to cause certain brothers and sisters in Christ to stumble. But you need to know the truth: I can't live a life of holiness by the sheer force of my will. It is God's work from beginning to end. How often I have tried to clean myself up apart from God's grace. But the same grace that saves, is the grace that sanctifies. How liberating it is to leave behind all of that pretense and run to the cross of Christ as my only refuge and defense. When you're done reading this I'll meet you there.

I hate when people find out the truth about me. I prefer that they view me as some type of “super-Christian”. It’s disheartening to have to share with people who I am and where I've come from and see something very like pity cross their faces.

I’m not going to lie, for several years now I have bristled and, for lack of a better word, freaked-out, when anyone has belabored the last few years of the drama that is my family. Mostly these people have included my mother and sister.

Last week it was time to tell a few people in Arkansas the truth about me: how my alcoholic, abusive father died when I was five, how my mother re-married a man when I was seven, whom she later divorced when I was twenty-five, because as it turned out He loved porn more than his wife and children. I am still working through many issues from this eighteen year period of abuse at his hands.

When I tell people the edited version of my story I try to keep things light and happy (if such a thing is possible) and end with “God is good, and He knows what He’s doing”, which is a truth I will readily give my assent to at anytime. However, the truth is that I am deeply scarred by this deeply fallen world, with all the issues and problems such scars bring. Knowing God is in control and working all things together for good doesn’t somehow exempt me from the “work” that working through all these issues involves. How glad I am that God is reconciling and restoring this world to Himself through Jesus Christ.

I hesitate sometimes to be “real”, a real person with real issues and struggles. The main reason is sin. I am full of pharisaical pride. As I was growing up I was taught that Jesus saved you so you could live a moral life on earth and one day go to heaven. I was in training to be a little Pharisee. The person who taught me this, not with words but through example, was my porn-loving dad. He didn’t smoke, drink, or cuss. He went to church every Sunday, and placed his ten-percent in the offering plate, but never one penny more, because that’s what "good" (read: nominal) Christians did. Of course, the rest of the week they could live like hell, as God seemed not to notice the other six days of their lives. Oh, and live like hell he did. He cheated on his wife (or should I say wives, as he has had several), mentally and emotionally abused his three oldest children every single day, and resented (and as far as I know still resents) every minute of his pseudo-Christian life.

So most of my life I lived with this example of what a “good” Christian looks like on the outside, and was taught that on the inside I could be full of dead men’s bones and it was just fine with God. But it wasn't. For the past three years or so God has been completely blowing my mind with the truth of who He really is and how I am to relate to Him on the basis of that truth.

I’m so glad that since eternity God has been pursuing me for a relationship with Him through Jesus Christ. I mean, that is just unbelievable. All of those years of hurt and pain, all of those hurtful, hateful words hurled at me, the snubs, and belittling that went on behind closed doors have only served to bring me to God. He has taken all of those truly horrible, sinful things and brought them into subjection in order to serve His purpose and bring me to Himself. Only a sovereign God could be capable of such a thing.

I know God did and does allow horrible things to take place in my life, and not just in my life, but in the lives of others as well. What is He about? I know, because the Bible says so, God is angry with the wicked every day. God will judge my dad, as He will judge me. The question is: am I under His mercy through Jesus Christ, or under His wrath without an Advocate. I have hope through God’s Word and the witness of the Spirit that it is the former.

The summer I entered high school I went to a Christian camp and promptly fell in love with the son of a missionary. In my eyes he could do no wrong – my love for him was absolute and unconditional, until the day I heard him say “crap”. Being the son of missionary cannot always be fun. To be under the scrutiny of people at all times must be wearying. It must be something very like being an actual missionary...

Anyway, when I heard him say the forbidden word I immediately lost respect for him. How a “good” Christian could ever have a crappy day, much less use that disgusting, and decidedly “un-Christian” word to describe it was beyond me (also note this was about thirteen years ago and I was a sheltered little home-schooler. We didn't say things like that in my home. Adultery, yes. Naughty words, no). Little did I know that there would be days in my life when nothing would seem to express the way I felt like a really good cuss word (and not “crap” either. I mean a really good one).

But, you will say, what about the Bible verse which says “let no unwholesome word come out of your mouth, but only that which is good for edification”? Oh, absolutely. That’s why I hold back most of the time (I dare not say all of the time. I have too many reliable witnesses who would be more than willing to confess to how much I love a well-chosen cuss word). But often times this restraint is motivated, not by faith in God’s love for me when He commands such behavior, but by the desire to appear admirable to people. Also, if there is anybody out there who loves me like I loved Brian Estep, I would much rather they go on loving me, than not.

All this to say that I am ready to talk about my past again; I haven’t been for a really long time. You see, I’ve been convicted lately about what a Pharisee I am. It’s so easy to slip into that mindset when no one knows your past and you can work off of how you appear now - if not really sanctified, than at least better behaved. It is wearying, and evil. I’m not advocating bad behavior for the sake of not being a Pharisee; but I am advocating that I stop putting my hope in good behavior and my own ability to live a moral life.

I want to step out of the filthy rags of self righteousness, clean out these dead bones, and cling ferociously to Jesus and His righteousness. I suck at living a moral life. Why? Because the Holy Spirit will never endorse or enable me to do it apart from Jesus. The Holy Spirit is a real big fan of Jesus, I’ve found.

In the midst of hurt, pain, and sin I thank God that He’s still drawing me to Himself through Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. He doesn’t give up, just relentlessly pursues me. So now you know the truth about me – a broken, messed-up, sometimes foul-mouthed sinner, who needs Jesus to keep on saving her from these things and saving her to her highest purpose: glorifying God and enjoying Him forever through and because of the person and work of Jesus Christ, and Him alone.

It is the ultimate freedom.