Liberty

To seek His kingdom is to seek higher ways, and to seek higher ways is to seek Him! Who is He?  How does He love me?  Since love is who He is (as opposed to what He does) His love for me remains total, absolute, and unqualified.  He loves me just as I am without any coercion towards change. If I never improve, progress, or bear fruit, He still loves me and accepts me as His own.

Still, it is natural to bear fruit.  Progress is, by definition, a normal aspect of growth. Humanity was formed from dust, but God also breathed His life into us.  On one-hand we are tied to the earth, on the other we have a God-breathed quest to reach for our heavenly origins.

God breathed life into mankind and made us the guardians of creation.  Humanity’s fall affected creation on every level, but God had a plan for redemption before the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8). Christ in us was always our hope of glory. When God looks at us He sees a new creation in Christ. He sees His own righteousness, not religion’s self-righteous imposter. His vested righteousness in us is the reason we are freely loved and accepted.  In Christ, nothing can separate us from His love.

Christian maturity is usually acknowledged when His righteousness in us makes its way to the outer world in which we live.  We find approval through the manifestation of His higher ways.  Even though we are still loved, we are likely unsatisfied without tangible evidence of His life in us. His divine breath imparted an upward call and it is now our natural desire.

1 Corinthians 15:41-51 says that the first man Adam was made a living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.  It talks about an earthy natural body, and a spiritual body.  One is sown in corruption and weakness, the other is raised in incorruption and power.  As we have all borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.  Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; the spiritual inherits the spiritual. Flesh and blood returns to the dust of the earth, for it is earthy.  Our spirit, quickened by His Spirit, is raised in the resurrection of the dead. We have the assurance that we are changed, are being changed, and will be eternally changed.

In the here and now, accepting ourselves just as we are is an important step of faith that affirms our belief that we are loved, not because of what we’ve done, but because of what He’s done. It is the key to believing we are loved no matter what.  Knowing that we are loved no matter what relaxes us so that we can receive the grace that will conform us to godliness.  Change has already occurred in spirit; heaven is already within us; we are already living in eternal life. We often make anxious, even violent efforts to get free from certain behaviors because we are, inadvertently, trying to redeem flesh and blood – that which will only return to dust. We try to make ourselves bear the image of the heavenly because we loathe the image of the earthy. This is not love in action! The spiritual change that has occurred inwardly cannot manifest as easily outwardly if we feel we have to change in order to be loved or accepted. More importantly, that which began in the spirit cannot be completed by the flesh (Galatians 3:3).

Christ proved God’s passionate love for us by dying in our place while we were still lost and ungodly! And there is still much more to say of his unfailing love for us! For through the blood of Jesus we have heard the powerful declaration, “You are now righteous in my sight.” And because of the sacrifice of Jesus, you will never experience the wrath of God. So if while we were still enemies, God fully reconciled us to himself through the death of his Son, then something greater than friendship is ours. Now that we are at peace with God, and because we share in his resurrection life, how much more we will be rescued from sin’s dominion! And even more than that, we overflow with triumphant joy in our new relationship of living reconciled to God—all because of Jesus Christ! Romans 5:8-11 (TPT)

In Christ, we are saved from the wrath of God. When the false (fall-based) pressure to manufacture our own change is removed, then we find not only the correct desire to change, but also the grace to do so.  As a branch, we can only draw the life-giving energy of the Vine through our vital union with the Vine.  The life-giving force behind change is in the Vine, not the branch. Repentance has as much to do with turning away from the pride of self-reliance and toward the humility of reliance upon Christ as it has to do with turning away from sinful patterns.  Sinful patterns remain rooted if we continue to rely upon our own strength as our way of escape.

When we are convinced that His love has no conditions, then we find the grace to naturally change and to conform to His will. The life of Christ living in us is the headspring of this grace. To receive love, apart from the evaluation of outward change, is the step of faith that unlocks grace.  To accept ourselves with all of our frailties and many failures is to accept and embrace the same person that God embraces.  He loves us with no strings attached.  He is not looking for something from us in return for His love.  He won’t love us more if we progress and He won’t love us less if we digress.  Can we receive the kind of love that He offers?  Will we receive unconditional love and retain our ‘loved position’ even when we are not happy with our performance?  Will we accept His statement as the official report?

He loves and accepts us whether or not we ever change.  We say those words, myself included, as if we believe them and yet our countenance, posture, attitude, and action often points to unbelief.  We need to hear it again and again, “He loves and accepts us whether or not we ever change.”  This is how He loves, it is the kingdom way.  We don’t have to change in order to please the Lord.  Christ in us is the source of His good pleasure toward us.  The Holy Spirit is the evidence, witness, testimony, or fruit of holiness within us.  This means that we are free to seek Him instead of seeking ways to change.  As we do, the changes we crave start to occur.

To receive His love the way He’s chosen to give it is to receive His love through our union with Christ in us, as us.  Christ is the beloved Son in whom the Father is well-pleased.  The privilege of hearing and receiving His holy counsel was purchased through the consummate blood sacrifice of Christ.    Jesus is why we mean so much to the Father.  He is the reason God’s love is so unrestrained.  We are reconciled to God through His death, and we are saved by His life.  Apart from Him, we lived in the miserable cycle of repeatedly failing in our vain attempts at self-righteousness.

Self-improvement does not earn His love.  Christ proved God’s passionate love by dying for us while we were still lost and strung out on sin and deprivation.  In Him, we are accepted.  He is our safety and cleansing, our ark in the midst of a purifying flood. To try to gain favor apart from Christ is blasphemy.  We do not want to profane the gift purchased with blood with futile and religious attempts at performing our way into His good graces.

I have stopped trying to change;  instead, I am learning to receive His love even in what seems like an absence of change. Judging and criticizing myself is an old pattern but now I am taking a higher road.   Love changes everything and change is occurring even if I cannot see it. I may not like how I think or behave right now, but loving myself in spite of it promotes an atmosphere for change. Change cannot occur where there is judgment.  Judgment of self (and others) chokes all true growth.  Acceptance is the breathing room that is necessary for change to occur.  Apart from His love for me there is no love in me for myself or anyone else.  He is the lover of my soul.  He is drawing me in, pulling me close, and capturing my full attention again and again.  I ache for the depths of His love that I might love others as (in the same way that) He loves me.

God said:  “I delight in My unchanging love.”  Micah 7:18

My clumsy mistakes in life are redeemed by love. Learning to love my entire human experience is helping me develop gratefulness for how intricately I am made. A healthy view of myself is building a self-respect that protects me from the opinions, prejudices, and false notions of how life should look.  The indwelling life of Christ is my hope for realizing dignity, hope, and attainable goals for my life. He is the key to focusing on that which is eternal instead of that which is temporal, and for acting in accordance with who I really (already) am.

If I am already where I want to be – raised up and seated with Christ in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 2:6) – then I don’t have to try to get there. This ends the struggle of trying to fix mistakes or the fear of feeling the need to reverse the damages.  From God’s vantage point, everything in my life has produced results. It took it all to get me here. Yes,  erroneous beliefs form imbalances but even the imbalances have taught me well. I can embrace it as the mentor it has been. Through it I have found my undeniable need for an awareness of His active presence; I have been leveled as I came face to face with my own humanity.  Through it I have understood the struggle of others; I have been humbled.  It has been my journey toward accepting who I am, who I am not, what I want, and what I don’t want. A cycle of failure led me to greater faith.  It led me to a determination to view myself in union with His life, and to an absolute trust in His ability to work all things out for the good…His indwelling presence has always led me to peace.

Fighting addictive behavior (as though it were my enemy) only strengthened addictive behavior. To comprehend this principle frees me to love my enemy as that which has led me to faith. Here’s the paradox: It is the fight that kept me from the truth and it is the fight that led me to the truth. In the end, it is love that won the war. My Lord continues to carve the private spaces within me where He and I can discuss the freedom for which Christ has set me free. In this space I remember all that I know. It is in this secret chamber that I am stilled so that I can know that He is God. It is here that I catch glimpses of new ways of living, moving, and being.

For a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith–of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire–may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. 1 Peter 1:6-9 (NIV)