Trust, love, faith and other things I don't understand

Ever since confronting my faith I've been digging deeper into my spiritual life and how I've been letting it (or not letting it) saturate my life.

At this point, the only thing that brings any sense of peace to my life is the possibility of trusting Him in ways I never have before. I feel as if I have no idea what life is going to bring and the mistakes I've made trying to steer my own course cut me. I wonder how many wonderful things have been lost to me forever because of my own ineptitude and delusions of power. This past summer I lost the one thing that meant the most to me in part because I gave in to fear. God has used that to move me closer to Him and the "what if"'s are endless and essentially pointless, so I refuse to dwell on them any longer. I'm learning to let Him in not because I believe I'll gain something in the end since, after all, "trust at the mercy of what it receives is bogus trust". No, I'm submitting because I've screwed up and hurt myself more often than I had realized by trying to do things my way. And I'm so tired of hurting.

I talk at God a lot, but it's a very one-sided conversation. Often I would listen to what He had to say then shrug and say "Good idea. Thanks for the input. But I'm gonna go ahead and do it THIS way." More recently I've been actively trying to change this tendency toward making God my sounding-board and not my guide, but it's not easy. Acknowledging my desire to be 100% self-sufficient isn't the end and it wasn't even the difficult part, I found. No, the hard stuff is putting it into practice when every natural inclination I have is to turn my back and walk alone. It's a learned response - not even something I have to think about. I pray, ask for forgiveness and listen to what He has to say... then an hour later I begin to tune Him out again. I'm even gun-shy of saying or thinking "Hey, I think I'm getting the hang of it!" because as soon as I feel as if my grasp on the concept is firm, I say "I got it, God. I'll take it from here." and the whole cycle repeats itself.

What's even more baffling to me is the notion that God doesn't really care. He isn't concerned with how far along I'm moving or even if I'm moving at all. The only thing that matters to Him is my acceptance of the fact that I can't do it on my own and the only way to succeed - even a little bit - is by letting Him lead. There is nothing expected other than to live by this: "I am love. Period."

"Justice says: 'I owe you nothing, for you have broken the contract.' But where justice ends, love begins, and reveals that God is not interested merely in the dividends of the covenant. He is looking into the eyes of Israel from His depths to hers. He sees through the smokescreen of deeds good and bad to Israel herself. She glances up uneasily, 'Who? Me?'"*

My motives are not pure. A part of me acts out of selfishness and because my hands are grasping greedily at the blessings God has promised. And yet, I see these parts of my heart and I'm ashamed... and God says "I am with you, I am for you, I am in you. I expect more failure from you than you expect from yourself."*

Nothing else is taken into account but my acceptance, not even my unstoppable humanity.







(Stolen from "The Ragamuffin Gospel" by Brennan Manning. If you haven't read it, you are missing out on a lot.)