What if I am worth hating?

When my racing thoughts stop and the productivity and acclaim and noise quiets down, my deepest fear surfaces: what if I am worth hating?

For a long time I didn’t answer that question because I feared the reply.

I lived in a shut-off, tamped-down, disengagement. A low grade depression. A low grade life.

I grew up believing that God’s grace was enough, is enough, and should always be enough. But I wasn’t happy. There was no sense of fulfillment, peace, or “enough” in my life. I thought that made me a bad Christian. I had accepted Jesus into my heart, my sins were forgiven, I was supposed to be happy. I should have been happy. I believed Christians had a duty—a responsibility—to be joyful. Christians had the hope of heaven and the relief of forgiveness, a built in best friend and Savior. Non-Christians had Darwin and Nietzsche, chaos and meaninglessness. I had no idea how they even got up in the morning.

But instead of joy and security I lived in depression and guilt.

When I was little, I was not only a rule follower, I made up my own elaborate rules. There was a right way to do everything from the order I ate my food (from least favorite to favorite, vegetables first) to the right way to be a Christian. I thought God wanted me to do everything perfectly and was constantly afraid of failure. I repeatedly missed my own mark, failed to measure up to rules of my own design.

I carried this into adulthood.

I burdened myself with unrealistic rules and expectations to the point that fear of failure paralyzed me. Then I’d feel guilty. Then I’d feel guilty about feeling guilty. You get the idea.

I wrote last week about the transformative power of asking the flipside to my life’s haunting question. What if I asked not if I’m worth hating, but if I’m worth loving?

When I began to live my life as a Yes to the second question, everything changed.

I began to love myself. I began to believe that God might love me.

I found the true meaning of mercy: a compassion that forbears punishment even when justice demands it. Even when justice demands it.

I found a God that loves me even when I deserve punishment and smiting and consequences.

In my weaker moments, that question still haunts me. Am I worth hating?

But I’ve found that it no longer matters what that answer is. That answer is not the reality of who I am.

Regardless of where I’ve failed, God invites me into a new reality of love and being loved and loving others.

The answer no longer matters because I know that I am loved, even when I am worth hating.

T.S. Tuesday: Consequently I rejoice

From Ash Wednesday:

“Consequently I rejoice, having constructed something upon which to rejoice.”

This line prickles the hair on my Absolute loving neck. Either something is intrinsically praiseworthy or it isn’t. How can you make it up?

On the other hand, so much of my life and my story has been shaped by my choices to move forward, to choose to hope, to choose to rejoice. To participate in actions and beliefs and moments that lead me to rejoice.

I’ve heard love is a verb, love is an action, love is an orientation. I believe Love is a choice.

The power comes not in the pat answers, clichés, or absolutes, but in the choice to seek, to hope, to live.

I will rejoice because I can rejoice. I will hope because I can hope. I will love because I can love. And consequently I rejoice.

It's not you, it's me

For me, actually.

This blog, this place where I share my thoughts and musings and processings, is as much for me as it is for you.

This weekend I read a memoir titled, Stumbling Toward Faith, by Renee Altson.

It was incredible. There are no words for me describe the beauty of reading of someone else’s story, being offered an exquisite glimpse into someone else’s pain and questions, secret fears and fleeting hopes. It was a gift.

I was reminded of my need to write. Of the value of my story (and your story and sharing these stories).

Writing for me is an act of remembering. Even more, it is a discipline of thankfulness.

When God whispered to me to “write my love story” it was a command to share, but it was also a command to remember.

To remember the times I couldn’t step foot in a church. To remember the outrage I felt at injustice. To remember the first time I felt a real, a raw, a ragged hope begin to stir in my own honesty.

To remember so that I may be open to those who are still questioning, still angry, still hurt, still outside the camp, scoffing and alone.

Renee writes, "I like it in this little space of being loved. I like this newness, this fresh perspective, this ordinary holiness weaving itself into the tapestry of my life, and I want to worship something; I want to proclaim my gratitude, my awe, the miracle that I notice, that I see what's happening. I want to hold out my hands and say thank you."

Her book was just that: an offering of thanks.

And I hope that this blog would be a place where I could weave my own words of worship together.

To remember the first flickers of hope that led me to Love. To encourage you as you seek Love, as you seek to weave together the threads of hope and grace and redemption in your own life.

I hope you are encouraged. I hope my thoughts point to something greater than me.

I hope that, together, we can begin to acknowledge this newfound love, this newfound wonder, this everyday miracle that we can notice God's stirrings at all.