Tuesday February 2, 2011
Theme: Rethink: Authenticity
Weekend Music links on iTunes: No Not One - Brandon Heath, All Because of Jesus - Fee, You'll Come - Hillsong, How He Loves - John Mark McMillan
Read: John 6:37, Psalm 139:13, Matthew 11:28, Isaiah 1:18
Think: We all want to be loved for who we are. I remember when I was really struggling a few years ago, trying to figure out how to date after my first marriage ended and I felt very hurt and betrayed by the way that happened. My first attempts to “move on” were really hard lessons in life. In truth, I shouldn’t have started dating so soon. I got too involved with a couple of people I met online only to find they were not people I could feel safe around. The result was painful and humiliating to me.
It was in that period of time that a good long term friend who was a Christian and understood what I was going through told me “You’re just really hurting and wounded right now, all you want right now is unconditional love, and nobody can give that to you but God.” So I looked for non-dating opportunities where that unconditional love might be found. That’s when I found out about Celebrate Recovery (“CR”), a Christ-centered group that met at a nearby church. It was a safe place to go and be accepted as I was. In CR, I found other guys whose pain and grief at dealing with their stuff was something I could relate to as my own. And we didn’t have to struggle on alone, we could turn to each other and to Christ as well, for much needed healing. With confidentiality our code, we could confess and release what grieved us most about what we had done in our own lives, allowing God got to scrub our scarlet sins like wool, until they turned white as snow (see Isaiah 1:18).
Pastor Ben and Pastor Nick both gave powerful examples from their own lives about someone: a youth pastor (Nick) or a cherished friend who happens to be elderly (Ben), that made a huge differences in their own lives, allowing them to feel accepted for who they are, loved and appreciated unconditionally, and who made it clear that they believed in all that God had made them to be.
We all have the power and potential to be one of those people that inspires and comforts somebody. And we know that the world needs more of those kinds of people. Maybe that’s why Jesus could put aside his own will to do his Father’s, to come down from the safety of Heaven to a dangerous, distressed planet and try to rescue us from the wages of our broken-down, lowly lives (John 6:37-39). He could see both where we are now and what we might become if we got acceptance and forgiveness.
Do: Meditate on the following: How can Jesus bring you closer to the ‘life in full’ he wants for you and is calling you to live? What do you fear might separate you from that call to ‘life in full’?
Pray: God, you know where I most need to feel loved and accepted as I am today. Help me to feel that love and acceptance, and Father, where I have sinned or strayed, forgive me and help me to feel your grace, mercy and peace (2 John 1:3). Amen.
The eDevotional is written each week by a team of volunteers from Timberlake Church.