The sanctuary was not unique in any
way. The same high ceilings, the thin
tall windows were as any other church.
There was a platform, with the pulpit in the middle. The musical instruments were placed along the
sides. A line of mike’s stood where the
worship team led the music. She sat in the same place every Sunday. She looked
at the same blue carpet, and the same purple chairs, in the same church. The cross hung in the spotlights in the front
center wall. Some Sundays, the typical purple cloth
draped from side of the cross to the other.
Every Sunday.
She tried to be faithful to read
The Word but seemed to continually fall short of her own expectations. She couldn’t meet her own expectations; she
had no hope of ever meeting the expectations of God.
Weekly, she attended church and she
worshipped as the worship team sang. On
occasion she tried her hand at teaching, she volunteered at the senior center. She directed VBS and deserved a chest of medals for that endeavor! She took notes as the pastor spoke. She was working hard at the business of being
a good Christian woman. Yet as hard as
she pushed to check off each box, she felt empty inside. She had prayed for her forgiveness
several years ago. And she believed she
had been forgiven.
Sort of.
Hidden beneath the “proper”
exterior of this woman who sought after God, the whole mess was still churning. Deep inside, she hid those things that still
shamed her. The wretched decisions of
her past still scarred her soul. The
pain was deep and alive within her. There were times that she thought she had
left it behind. She thought she was
successfully moving forward, but a song, a sermon, a testimony from one of
those “charmed” women who never had regrets or made a bad choice would bring
the pain to life. She kept on, kept on
pretending she had it all together. She
pretended that she wasn’t shattered inside.
Maybe if she was good enough, God
would find her acceptable. But she could
not seem to ever reach that pinnacle of “good enough.” She felt she couldn’t even reach “adequate”. It was so tiring to keep trying. She slumped against the back of her chair and
began her pleading with God to make her good enough, to make her acceptable. She jumped when a man walked up to her row,
pointed to the seat next to her and asked “Is that seat taken?”
She glanced around the sanctuary,
nearly empty, frowned but told him it was not.
She squeezed her knees together as he walked around her to sit in the
very next seat. She was not exactly
thrilled that he chose to sit so close; she shifted comfortably in her seat. She
turned to pointedly look down the row of vacant seats. He wasn’t catching the hint. She brought her attention back to the lite
cross at the front of the church and began the litany of sins to be forgiven
of. Her sins were too big for simple
forgiveness. The shame she lived with,
stuffed inside.
She barely started her prayer
telling God she was unworthy of his forgiveness, and she would try harder to be
worthy…to make up for those wretched choices.
The man shifted restlessly in the chair.
Again he was interrupting her prayer….
“I have a message for you.” He quietly spoke.
She huffed at the bang that fell over
her forehead and into her eyes. Just a
little irritated that he interrupted her quiet time before the service, she
answered. “Okay. What is the message?”
He looked up at the lite Cross in
the front of the church and nodded to it.
“Intriguing how something so simply made could be so wretched and
beautiful at the same time.” He spoke quietly in his observation. “The message is, God wants you to know He
loves you.”
She pulled away from him slightly,
thinking okay just another freak. “Yeah,”
she answered. “That’s what the Bible
tells us.”
“It’s not just what the Bible says,
it’s what God says. He wants you
personally to know He loves you.”
Just a little irritated, she
shifted in her chair, planning to reach for her Bible bag and find another
spot. The stranger took her hand, and
shocked by his audacity, she looked at him.
His eyes were amazing. Again, he
spoke “Sophie, God loves you.”
Okay that was a little freaky but she
had attended this church for months.
Surely someone knew her name here, someone told him. But he squeezed her hand and again told her,
“Sophie, God LOVES you.”
Her lips trembled as she whispered,
“Only because he has to. But He doesn't even
like me like He loves Miss Atha, or Laurie, and Pam. She gestured around her,
but the stranger stopped her, “No Sophie.
God loves YOU.”
She moved that annoying piece of
hair away from her eyes again and looked at him warily. “That’s nice, thank you for the message. It’s been delivered, so you may go on to
where ever you came from.” She really
hoped he would move on. She picked up her purse and looked around the
sanctuary. Where had everyone gone?
The stranger sighed and shook his
head, “No Sophie, I gave you the message, but you have not yet received it.”
She objected slightly snarky, “I
heard it.”
“But you don’t believe it.” His voice reached toward her.
She looked at him again; this time
she gazed into the most amazing eyes. Deep browns, amber swirls, his eyes drew
her back into the chair. Tears began to well in her eyes. Angrily, she wiped them again. “You don’t understand what I have done. I have to try to be worthy of the sacrifice
Christ made for me, and I keep failing him.
I know He forgave me but some - it’s too awful to be forgiven. I’m too ugly inside for Him to love me.”
“Oh Sophie, you are so close yet
still you are blind.” He turned his head
back to the cross and spoke, “The blood shed on the cross wasn’t just for the
little sins, or the acceptable sins.
There is NO sin acceptable to God.
When you pray for forgiveness, the Father does not pick and choose
which sin He will forgive and forget.
Grace covers it all. No one is
worthy of the price but that is the beauty of the act. Every person comes unacceptable but is made
worthy by the sacrifice. Every person
Sophie, even the person you don’t let anyone see.”
Her eyes widened, no longer aware
of anyone else, she whispered to him “But you don’t know who I really am. What I am capable of or how wretched parts of
my life are.”
She looked up again into the eyes
of the man as he answered, “Yes, Sophie I know who you really are. I know what you keep hidden. You keep taking them out and YOU decide
that grace was not enough. So you refuse
to believe God’s grace is big enough for you.
But it is and God loves you.”
She lowered her head, took her eyes
off his and looked away. She bit her lip
a moment, then shaking her head she told him, “I understand what you are
saying. Okay. God loves me, but you don’t know the kind of
things that I did, or the kind of things that torment me. I don’t deserve forgiveness or His love.”
“Sophie. How do I make you understand? You were created for God to love. God created you, and then he chose all the
parts of your ancestry needed to produce the woman that you are. God loves you Sophie. You prayed for your forgiveness. God granted that for you. You are holding on to sins and anguish over
things that your Heavenly Father has no memory of. You are the new creature!”
He picked up her Bible and recited
to her, “2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore,
if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has
gone, the new is here! Sophie, that’s how God sees you. The beautiful woman He created. He loves you!”
Sophie’s heart began to throb. Her heart wanted to believe. She so wanted to be new again.
Her stranger took her hand, and looked into her eyes. She could not turn away as he held her hands
and told her, “That is why God is so wounded by your unforgiveness.”
She could not stop the cold shock the rushed through her
veins. God was wounded? She protested…”I have forgiven everyone who
hurt me, every single one! The ones who didn’t
deserve to be forgiven, the ones who never apologized, even the people who did despicable
things to me.”
He nodded, and held up her Bible again. “This Word says in Colossians 3:13 Accepting one another and forgiving one another. If anyone has a complaint against
another. Just as the Lord has forgiven
you, so you must also forgive. Sophie,
there is yet one person you have not forgiven.”
His eyes held the wonder of the world, and Sophie saw
everything that was pure and good in them. She trusted this man. Her chin trembled as he spoke to her, and
everything in her started to shake at his words, “Sophie, forgive yourself.”
At this point, the sobs erupted
from the most deeply damaged parts of her heart.
The stranger placed his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close to
his side. She should have been offended,
but she was not. She should have been
frightened, but she was not. She was
feeling loved and comforted. Her storm
of tears subsided and she asked him, “How do I forgive myself?”
He reached over to pull her notepad
out of her Bible bag. “Let’s try this. First
we determine that you are no longer accountable for things you have been
forgiven for. You are going to let them
go. Write down every ugly thing that you
think is unforgiveable. Write down the
ugliness and the actions. You write down
all those thoughts that make you FEEL that God can’t love you. Write down what shames you, and Sophie, You
know God is not the author of shame. HE
is not the one who keeps you cowering in His presence.”
She looked at him a moment before
asking, “If I was guilty, shouldn’t I be ashamed?” He shook his head again and explained, “Guilt
is good. Guilt convicts and admits you
did something wrong. Shame is
different. Shame says there’s something
wrong with you, something that makes you undesirable, unlovable and
unforgiveable.” He leaned toward her,
his breath in her ears. And he said, “Beloved
daughter. Release the shackles that bind
you.”
She gasped. That was exactly how she felt…shackled to
these past memories. She started writing
hesitantly and then as the pain bubbled out, her words poured out onto the pad
in scorching intensity. The stranger sat
back and watched her. Looking up, she handed
him her finished list…all the reasons she believed she should not be forgiven.
He tore the page off the tablet and
held the sheet up with both hands. Then
he tore the paper in half.
“It’s been forgiven, covered by the
blood, washed clean as if it never happened.”
He tore it again. “God’s love is
deeper than any shame your enemy can conjure up.” He ripped it again.
“But God
demonstrates his own love for Sophie in this: While you were
still sinning, Christ died for Sophie.” And again he ripped the
paper. Sophie watched the pieces of
paper grow smaller and felt cracks of light entering her heart. It was pushing
out the darkness as he continued to tear apart her shame. He spoke as he
continued to tear apart her shame and fears.
“Who then is the one who condemns you? No one. Christ Jesus
who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the
right hand of God and is interceding for you!”
Sophie’s smile beamed
to him, as the pieces became like confetti.
She leaned back in her seat, and rested her head against the padded
back. She took a steadying breath and
she said it to herself, “I forgive me.”
His voice was so gentle as she remembered his words, one’s she had read
in dozens of Bible studies, but this time she believed them. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation
has come: The old has gone, the new is here! Sophie, that’s how God sees you, the beautiful woman he
created. He loves you!”
Sophie smiled as the cleansing peace filled her from
inside. A tap on her shoulder stopped
her, it was elderly Miss Jensen. “Sophie dear,
are you okay. You have sat alone here
for quite a while. Is that seat taken?” Sophie turned to introduce Miss Jensen to her
new friend. He was gone. Only pieces of confetti littered the chairs
and floor. She moved down a seat for Miss
Jenson, and turned to her.
Sophie smiled at her, and asked “Miss Jensen, do you know
that God LOVES you?”
My dear reader, this is something that I worked on, trying to express my own journey to grace. I too believed that some sins were just too big and bad for God to overlook. I let Satan tell me that God couldn't forgive ALL my sins. The hardest thing for me was just accepting that God's grace covered all, that He doesn't pick and choose. It's a work done once. Forgiving myself took a lot longer to process. Some say, you cannot forgive yourself, that God never asked us to, nor does the Bible suggest to us that we do. But my experience was that I was able to forgive many people for the damages done against me. But I still held myself responsible, and sought justice against myself. I needed to punish myself by withholding some sin out of God's grasp, not giving it over to Him, not accepting His Grace.
There was a day in the most painful day of my life that I felt in my beat up weakened and painful state, that God came and sat on the end of my recliner and held a similar conversation with me. It was the day I accepted that nothing I could do was needed to earn His love and relationship. And nothing I have done would take it away. He loved ME.
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