Heaven's Heart and Hope's Restart

"A second chance is Heaven's heart" --Second Chance, Rend Collective Experiment. 

And thank God that these words are true. 

The words to this song are so powerful and so very relevant to what I have to say, I'll post them all here:

  

My future hangs on this
You make preciousness from dust
Please don't stop creating me

Your blood offers the chance
To rewind to innocence
Reborn, perfect as a child

CHORUS:
Oh Your cross, it changes everything
There my world begins again with You
Oh Your cross, it's where my hope restarts
A second chance is Heaven's heart

When sin and ugliness
Collide with redemption's kiss
Beauty awakens by romance

Always inside this mess
I have found forgiveness
Mercy as infinite as You

(Chorus)

BRIDGE:
Countless second chances
We've been given at the cross
Countless second chances
We've been given at the cross

Fragments of brokenness
Salvaged by the art of grace
You craft life from our mistakes

Black skies of my regrets
Outshone by this kindness
New life dawns over my soul

(Chorus)
(Chorus)
(Bridge)

I've loved this band, and their art of singing the words of God so beautifully, for a while now. But the words of this song are what I feel I am experiencing now. I am watching God salvage brokenness, and craft life from mistakes, outshining regrets with new life. I am seeing this in my life, and in lives of friends around me. Over the past month or so, I have begun to pray those more daring prayers. Ones that blatantly ask God to give me strength I know I don't have, prayers for miracles, for unexplained goodness, for Him to show me His power. And He has been answering! 

For a long time I have been battling recurring sins in my life. Some of them are "common," like worrying instead of trusting God, or like putting silly things before spending time with Him. Others are not the kind you casually throw out as prayer requests at the close of your bible study meeting, like having lustful thoughts, or like going back to unhealthy habits. Now I do understand that as humans, we all struggle to differing degrees with very similar issues throughout our lives, and that even as Christian humans, we are promised difficulty in obeying God. To follow God is a lifelong journey, and to surrender to Him is a daily effort--I believe these things with all my heart. 

In my Navs bible study recently, we read the passage where Jesus is praying in the garden just before his arrest, and his disciples have fallen asleep. An element of this story stood out to me this time that I hadn't processed before. Jesus both expected His disciples to be awake, like He commanded them to be, AND understood their humanness and weakness to obey His command. He says, "Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak" (Mark 14:38). He acknowledges that they will be tempted, and that their bodies are weak. His words to them later in this passage make it clear that they were supposed to have stayed awake, and that He's disappointed they didn't watch and pray. Yet He doesn't give up on them... just a few hours later, He is letting Himself be carted off to trial, eventually to be hung on the cross. And He is doing it for them, for us all. Jesus simultaneously understands our humanity, and expects more of our spirits. And this understanding/expectation for us revolves completely around what He did for us on the cross.

In my own strength, I have no hope of overcoming the sins of my past and of walking in freedom. But because of the cross, because of God's heart for redemption, I am more than just a human heart inside a weak body. I have a spirit, and I have HIS spirit, and it is because of the presence of His spirit in me that He can expect more of me. That He is justified in calling me to surrender the sin in my life to Him, to flee the darkness and embrace the light. 

And so I have hope. And I can walk in freedom. And I can choose to chase light. Christ has called me to be ready to give an account for this hope that I have within me (1 Peter 3:15), and so here is my account. This post is a bit more personal and open than others of mine have been, and hopefully that's okay. None of us are blameless, until we are covered by His grace. I've written about grace and about shame in past posts, and I am taking steps towards letting grace win out over shame in my life. I am a sinner and I am redeemed, and I'm not afraid to admit either part of that, because the first half says that I need God's love, and the second half says that He does indeed love me! 

I am finding that as I struggle with these sins in my life, God is so much greater!! For so long I have felt trapped, and I am just beginning to feel the freedom that comes with His second chances. I have always read the verses about being a new creation, and living free, and offering our whole selves as sacrifices. And I have believed them and even tried to live them, but I have not claimed them and relied on them the way that I am learning to do now. I used to wonder why God has allowed me to struggle with lust and other sins, but now I am starting to see the beauty He is bringing out of these struggles. Beyond the amazing fact that He has used and is using my story to encourage others in their own struggles, He is using every step of this journey to teach me more about Himself. The days where I ignore the cross and don’t trust in the second chances He is offering me, I miss all the incredible ways God is just waiting to bless me. Those days I feel weak and I mess up, and those days still happen sometimes. But the days where I focus on God and spend time with Him, I realize all the ways He wants to use me and give me the strength that I need to follow His commands. God has not only redeemed me as a person, but has redeemed my experiences with sin to bring me closer to Him and to encourage others. The amazing part of grace is that it takes what was once a source of shame and transforms it into evidence of the work of Christ. The lust, the fear, the selfishness, the pride, and any other sin, become an avenue through which God reveals His power to work in us. I am watching Him clearly bring life from sin that is meant to bring death, and it’s amazing.

My future hangs on the promise that God will continue to create me, making "preciousness from dust." Some days I will be weak, and will fall short of His commands, just like the disciples who fell asleep that night. But like the disciples, I will be given second chances. And just as Jesus valued those men and died to be their Savior, He values me and died for me, too. 

The point of making this public and posting it for (hypothetically) anyone to see: All of this can be true for you, as well. On that cross, Jesus died for all of us. 

Let the account of the hope I have within me become yours, too. Claim those second chances. Surrender to the confusing, messy, beautiful, unfair, life-giving, freeing, unmerited love of God for you. Join me in praying those bold prayers, in relying on Him to answer. Let your hope restart because of Jesus' love, displayed by the second chances He gave us through the cross. Yes, God expects much of us, and calls us to high standards (which lead us to fuller, richer, deeper lives). But He gives us the Holy Spirit and the freedom to follow Him because He defeated death on that cross as well. Let us not be discouraged by His great expectations, but remember Heaven's heart for second chances. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQRaxELspKg 

Stars, Stripes, and Scars

No, this post doesn't have anything to do with being American, the recent election, or my concerns for our country (though those are all post-worthy, I'm sure). Actually, this post has to do with shame.

Stars. They are what we are awarded for our successes on school papers, it is a name for someone who is popularly successful, they denote worth or achievement or, in the sense of the natural stars, beauty and wonder and even science.
Stripes. Stripes represent a pattern. When it's said that a zebra can't change his stripes, it means that this pattern he displays literally defines him and is beyond his control to change.
Scars. I think everyone knows what scars are, all too well. Whether physical or emotional, they tell the story of pain we have felt in the past, they bear testament to some injury we have suffered.

Shame is a tricky thing. Really, it tricks us. It tricks us into believing lies that otherwise would seem ridiculous and outlandish. Lies like "you're a failure," "you're worthless," "you don't deserve to be cared for," "you can't ask for help," "you're all alone," etc. Perhaps the biggest and most tricky lie that shame sells us is that things will always be the way they have been before. Shame tells us that in our pattern of accruing scars instead of stars, we have no hope of ever breaking free of that pattern, that we will always feel the way we feel now, do the things we do now, think and believe and live the way that we do now, or have in the past.

But those are all lies. (We're not zebras.)

The truth is that our failures do not define our worth. The truth is that we are surrounded by people who passionately care for us regardless of whether or not we deserve it. The truth is that we can ask for help, we can change, and things don't always have to be this way, or the way they were before.
Saying no to the lies that shame sells and saying yes the truths above takes risk. Taking heart, hope, faith---they're all a risk. Risky, not tricky. If we take a chance and hope, there is the potential to be let down. Aren't we down already, when we're living in shame? There's also a chance that we'll hope, and that those truths will turn out to be really true... and we'll be free and we'll have worth and shame will lose its grip.
Isn't that a risk worth taking?

You see, God knew what He was getting Himself into. He knows the depths of our hearts, and He loves us the same... that's why He's amazing. He delights in being our Savior. The God who sends mercy and goodness chasing after you all of the days of your life, the God who crafted you with intention and declared His work "good," is not put off by your shame. He is not ashamed of you, or of your need, rather He draws you to Himself, because He is the fulfillment of your need.
If you were strong enough to always believe in the truth, if you were ever convinced of your own worth apart from Him, then they wouldn't call it faith. If it wasn't absolutely vital to your well-being, then a relationship with Him wouldn't change your life.
But it is, and it does. And He loves that we need Him, because it brings us close to Him, and because HE LOVES US.
The ultimate condemnation for shame in a hypothetical court is that love. Shame claims all those things about us, but it has no case when we present God's love for us... the lies shame tells us cannot be true when we consider the nature of God's love. Unconditional. Neverending. Death-conquering. Healing. Life-bringing. Sin-expelling. Goodness-bringing. Soul-rescuing. Person-redeeming. The kind of love that clothes us in His righteousness and carries us to the table of the Most High. We have never been alone. He has been present since before we began to breathe and has been present throughout every struggle. He is present with you now, in this moment, and He has promised to always be present for all of eternity. That's a big promise, with giant implications.

Shame traps, truth frees. Shame is powerful. But where is the power of darkness when confronted with the light? One small candle can be seen for miles; imagine how God's truth can illuminate the darkness inside of you. Shame tries to keep us down, and it often succeeds. But don't stay down, my dear. Yes, shame is powerful. But shame cannot even begin to approach the power of that unconditional, neverending, death-conquering, life-bring, soul-rescuing, person-redeeming love with which GOD LOVES YOU.

Shame is a lie, and the truth is we are free, we are loved. I am free and loved. You are free and loved. Sometimes we must fight to believe the truth, we must push through the darkness and pray desperately for the truth to invade. Let us rest in this: there is nothing, including shame, that can ever separate us from the love of God that we have through Christ Jesus. <3

The Rhythm of Grace and Hugging the Ocean

I'm learning about grace.
I grew up with some understanding of the concept of grace, long able to recite the Sunday school answer for the difference between grace and mercy; mercy is being exempted from what one does deserve, and grace is being given what one does not deserve. (Namely, God's mercy saves us from eternal death, and His grace invites us to eternal life). But I'm finding that the depth of my understanding of grace has been lacking.
I know what grace is, sure, but how does it look for me to rest in God's grace for me? If I'm drowning in the ocean of God's grace, how should that affect how I think and act towards myself and towards others?
Like much of life with Christ, embracing His character and centering on some truth about His stance towards me has implications for countless daily goings-on. Grace is no exception.
Grace's response is often counter-intuitive for me. And I'm beginning to think maybe for all humans.
We seem to have this natural inclination to want to be punished when we've done something wrong, and when we're offered grace instead of condemnation, we have a remarkably difficult time foregoing self-punishment. Because we feel that what we deserve is the shame, hardship, and pain that our bad decision or failure merits.
But what we miss is the beauty that life with Christ isn't fair. And that that's a good thing. A really good, redemptive thing.
When we're honest with ourselves, all of our grandest schemes for bettering ourselves cause us to fall flat on our faces, discouraged and still full of failures. There exists these paradigm-like truths about personal growth and change with Christ in the picture, and they go like this: Until we can accept that we are loved exactly as we are, we have a hard time changing anything about ourselves. The best impetus for change within ourselves is not a deeply rooted dissatisfaction with our current state, however propelling that may be at times, but rather a passionate desire for what we see may lie ahead for us, and an unshakable hope that that future state is not beyond our reach.

"Grace, only grace, can move us to a rhythm that will change our ways." (Grace, Tenth Avenue North)

Like TAN's song so elegantly puts it, only grace really helps us to change. When I attempt to defeat myself, I am hindering the work of Him who is championing for my success. When I refuse the love of Him who has no business loving me, but does anyway, I'm being a fool... I'm turning from the one thing my heart truly longs for--the unconditional, forever kind of love. Only this love, so unaffected by whether or not I deserve it, is the kind that I can rely on, the kind that can change me from the inside out.
I'm still figuring out what living in grace looks like, practically. It requires a lot of surrender, and a lot of re-thinking about things. It requires the subtle shift from working on myself, to opening myself to the work that God is doing in me. I want to make new habits, let go of some things that don't belong in my life, and add and develop some things that I believe do belong here. God calls me to holiness, calls me to living like Him. But He doesn't do so without a promise to be my strength, and my hope, and fulfillment.

Grace is so wonderfully difficult, a bit like trying to hug the ocean. We cannot portion out bits of grace for ourselves, here and there when we feel we have earned it. That's not how it works. He just lavishes it out onto us, when we least deserve it and when we feel we've been good, all the same. If I've doled it out for myself, then it isn't grace. Grace is His to give, and any grace we are able to give to each other flows out of the grace we have received and are receiving from Him. There's just too much of grace for me to contain it and control it. You can't give the ocean a leisurely hug. You'd just get soaked, and pulled in by the tide, and possibly knocked off of your feet. Because that's how grace does work. It's overwhelming, and constantly flowing, and messy, and it rises to meet you again and again.

Gold Medals and Silver Linings

Last Sunday at Hershey Free Church I heard a really powerful analogy from Pastor Kevin Dixon. It challenged me, and has been stuck in my mind ever since. It aligns well with what I feel God has been trying to show me lately, and so I wanted to share it here, in my own words. 

Living life in a relationship with God is like recording the Olympics and watching them after you have heard who won the gold medal. Think about it... When you already knew who was going to win in the end, it took the stress out of watching the Olympics. With every faltering step, every glitchy landing, every missed point, you didn't freak out because you knew who would win anyways. Knowing how things end changes the way we watch, or at least it should. It would be ridiculous to wring our hands and get worked up over one lost point when we know that at the end of the game the U.S. would walk away with a ten point lead. 

In life, we know the ending. In the end, God wins. He wins it all. [Phil. 2:10] And so this should change the way we watch our lives and the lives of those around us unfold. Knowing the ending should change the way we watch the now. [John 16:33] Because every trial and loss we face, every storm with dark clouds that obscures our view of the light at the end of the tunnel, are nothing compared to the glory we will see as God redeems us, and the glory we will share when we join Him in Heaven one day! [1 Cor. 13:12] Life is painful and the problems we face are real. But they are overshadowed. Every menacing storm cloud is given a silver lining. It's like the typical love story of overcoming the odds to be together--though the challenges were there, they pale in importance next to the ending of joy. [Romans 8:18] We should not wring our hands in anxiety or give in to debilitating fear. [Matthew 6:25-33] Why? We know that God wins, but why does this set us free from fear and free to live joyfully and securely? Because the same God who wins is the God who died to draw us near.[John 3:16, Luke 19:10] This God who wins it all is the God who loves us more than we can comprehend, who sends goodness and mercy to chase us after us, who cherishes us, and who has great plans for us. [Romans 8:37-39, Psalm 23:6, 2 Peter 3:9, Jeremiah 29:11] 

No matter what my present looks like, I know that my God who has promised to return and take me with Him for eternity, will indeed return and do what He has promised! This promise, coupled with His promise to love me and let nothing separate us, should change everything. There is no room for fear in my life when I live in His great love for me, a love so powerful that He conquers even death. :) [Acts 2:24]

I know this post hasn't been eloquent or all-inclusive. I hope that as you read this, you are reminded that you have no need to fear. The God who wins in the end is the God who loves you, the God who is with you even now. :)

~"There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love."1 John 4:18 <3 ~

Tents, Tears, and Testimonies

I have been wanting to write and share my thoughts since I came home from Creation, but the time in between then and now just means I will just have even more to share! :P

Two times in the last month hearing the gospel has brought me to tears. And I'm glad... God is showing me more and more of who He is. He is opening my eyes to what it means to love Him and be loved by Him. I've always known that God was big, and great, and good. Known in my mind that is, but over the years I am continually impressed by how He is teaching me those things experientially as well. And no, that's not really a word :P The more I seek Him, the more I realize there is to find. Loving God and being loved by Him is this beautiful, never-ending friendship between me and Him.

It's hard to describe what God has been doing in my life. He has been reminding me and helping me to see in new ways basic truths about Him and about life. Some of these things I've known and believed for years, but just now are they beginning to seep into my heart and my mind. I want to move from knowing and believing in God to letting the truth I know and believe affect every single aspect of my life. This "God-thing" isn't one compartment of my life or of my heart, it isn't one part of who I am, it doesn't affect one piece of life... this me-and-Jesus thing IS life. The gospel, the good news that God loves me and paid the price for us to be close to each other for the rest of forever, should be central to my every thought, every action, every day. This truth, this relationship, should change how I see myself, how I see others, how I love and how I live on the deepest level possible.

While I was at Creation I started getting to know a girl, whose name I'll leave out here. She is dealing with some very real, very painful feelings and struggles. My heart breaks for her, seeing how every day involves so much hurt and so little hope. She isn't believing in the truth of who she is in Christ. It's a hard thing to do, to trust that He knows you completely, sees your gigantic need for Him, and loves you more than you can comprehend, enough to endure torture, beat death, and chase after your heart every day. Because we as humans just don't act like that, just don't love like that. It's confusing and it's overwhelming and it's mind-blowing. If someone really loved like that, it would change everything, wouldn't it?
When we begin to let Him into our hearts and our lives, it does change everything. Just like my friend, it is so hard for us to let go of the lies... maybe they are awful, but they are simple and familiar and don't require faith. Some days, I let the lies take over. I push out the Holy Spirit's voice and I turn to the lies of Satan, only to find that once again he falls short and leaves me feeling empty. But I have tasted what it's like to live in light of God's love. I know how amazing it feels to take steps in faith, trusting in His love and letting my identity in Him be my only identity. And there's no going back now.

Before and during Creation an image developed in my mind. Throughout my life I have moving towards God, my faith I know a gift from Him in and of itself. But for the past several years it's been more like stumbling towards Him. For a short while I will walk or even run, but then stumble and slowly resume the journey. This can't be a half-hearted run towards Him. Instead of slowly stumbling along, I want this to be a full-on sprint. Not because I am afraid of what is behind me, but because of how much I want what is before me. I'll still stumble and fall, but I don't want it to slow me down anymore. The greatness and complexity of God and His plan for salvation requires a full surrender from me. I have been set free from sin and there is nothing behind me that is strong enough to keep me from running towards God. In fact, He is beside me, guiding me and loving me along the way.

This post has been entirely disjointed and not articulated well, but that's okay. The title is to remind me of my main points: Tents-- it was at Creation that God re-touched my heart with the gospel and opened my eyes to truth about Him and life with Him. Tears-- to quote Tenth Avenue North, "we are free to struggle, hallelujah we aren't struggling to be free!" Testimonies-- God is at work in all of our lives, and our journeys are testimonies to His love :)
God is real, His love for you is real. He wants all of you like He wants all of me. He's complicated and He's worth everything we have to give and more. I want to run to Him, I want to dive into life with Him, and this is a public proclamation of my intentions! :)

Francis and Florida

Now is probably the only considerable amount of free time I'm going to have in the near future, so I thought it would be a good time to write. 

I did end up reading and finishing Francis Chan's take on heaven and hell, "Erasing Hell." I liked his perspective as much as, if not more than, Rob Bell's on the matter. Chan's respect for God, and His power to be and do whatever He wants, is refreshing. I think that while God can and does relate to us on a very human level, it's sometimes easy to let His nearness overshadow His greatness and power. The reason we can relate to God is because He is our Creator, and He fashioned each of us in His likeness, with pieces of His character woven into our hearts. But He is so much more than us... so much more complicated, powerful, good, just plain so much more. I like that Chan bases his conclusions on those truths. Chan also addressed the subject with both confidence and humility, something I consider an impressive feat! He concludes that hell is a real place, where real people will experience real and ongoing suffering. Much more definitive than Bell's conclusion, with a lot of exploration along the way to that conclusion. My thoughts remain the same as they were in my previous posts, but perhaps with an expanded view of God's character. Chan challenges us to ask ourselves not, "Do I feel like believing in a God who sends people to hell?" but instead "Could I believe in a God who sends people to hell?" Though a somewhat subtle difference, the two questions are quite distinct. I must develop the kind of faith that believes in a God outside of my ability to understand Him and His ways. I don't get to define Him and instruct Him, but I do get to seek Him and find Him. He is God, and in the end, whatever that may look like, I choose to trust that He will be all good, loving, powerful, and just in a way that only He can harmonize. 

I'm currently reading a book by Francis Chan about the Holy Spirit, and anticipate posting my thoughts on it after I finish it. :)

Next topic. I just got back from a lovely vacation in Florida with my family! It was loads of fun, filled with laughter and memories and adventures. While there, I realized for the millionth time this year how thankful I am for my family. We have our quirks, our share of spirited discussions and tense moments, but I can always count on them to care. And I know that that isn't something everyone can count on. I'm so thankful for them, because no matter what else is going on in my life, no matter what anyone else thinks of me, at the end of the day I have five amazing people who will always love me. And that is more amazing than I ever realized before... maybe it is that the brutal truth of how the real world works has been creeping into my rose-colored worldview, but I have previously undervalued the care and love my family gives to me. I have always been thankful, but now more than ever! As things change, and they constantly do, it is so comforting to know I have a handful of people who love me as near to unconditional as humans are capable of loving. And within that handful I count my family, along with a couple of outstanding friends. :)

I have also been considering a few other philosophical/personal topics, but I think this will do for now. In a few days I will head to Creation, which will no doubt fill me with plenty of thoughts to share! [That's a promise for a future blog post ;) ]

Questions: Of Heaven, Hell, and Hope [Pt. 2]

Well, I just finished the book ("Love Wins" by Rob Bell). And that will just have to suffice for an introduction.

Some people argue over whether "love wins" or "God wins"... those are actually two separate book titles that have come to represent two separate so-called camps of Christians. But God is love. He is the very definition of love, He embodies love. So when God wins, so does love. Or, when love wins, it's because love IS God, and He has won.

This book has really broadened my perspective/mindset on my own faith. It articulated some concepts that I think I've been buying into for some time without being able to aptly express them. I have always believed in a loving God. And I have never been comfortable with a God who would actively send people to hell, forever apart from Him. [I hasten here to point out that I need not be comfortable with God for Him to be true, or good, or right, or loving.]
Over the past few years I've become fond of the idea that real love brings freedom--in true love fear of rejection is banished, and a love that is real must be a love that has been chosen.
My beliefs about heaven and hell and the fate of mankind are not all easily explained, black and white, and concrete. Some are. There are things I believe to be true about God that I have been convinced of since elementary school, and continue to cling to and depend on. But my understanding of heaven and hell, and more importantly, my understanding of who God is and how He interacts with us as humans, are ever-developing. From page 175 of "Love Wins" until the end, I agree with the majority of what Rob Bell says. The God that Bell describes in these pages is the God that I am in love with... the God who has, and does, and always will love His people. The God who loves us enough to let us choose Him, and consequently, to also not choose Him.

I really enjoy two illustrations Bell uses at the end of the book. They spring from the well-known story of the prodigal son. Bell explains that in this story, are really three stories. There is the older son's story--what he believes about his father, himself, and the way their relationship works. This older son is separated from his father's love because he has a wrong understanding of how his father's love works. He thinks he can earn it, in fact he thinks he has earned it. He misses the truth that he never had to earn anything, that his father's love always has been and will continue to be given freely. His father loves him beyond a reason why, and there's nothing he can do to deserve that love or to drive it away. Then there's a younger son, and his story. This younger son is separated from his father's love because he, also, has a wrong understanding of how his father's love works. Instead of self-righteousness, his hang-up is that he feels unworthy. And he is. But his father disregards that, because in the same way that the father loves the older son beyond a reason why, so he freely loves the younger son. No amount of obedience increases his love for his sons, and no amount of disobedience can jeopardize his love for his sons.
This is how God loves us.
We, like the sons in this story, are left with a choice. Do we choose our version of the story? Or do we choose our Father's?
Do we trust in ourselves, or do we trust in our Father's love?
"You rewrote my name, and shackled my shame, and opened my eyes to see, I am free"--these are lyrics from a song called Liberty by Shane and Shane. God has rewritten our stories, setting us free from our own versions of our past.
We can all tell stories of the good and the bad we have lived through, the fantastic and awful things that have been done to us, and the wonderful and horrible things we have done ourselves. But God tells a different story about each of us. In His story, those things we have experienced and done still matter. They have real consequences and shape our world. But they are not what is most important, they do not define us or our fate. Only His love defines us. And we are given a choice that determines what our life will look like, now and later, and that choice is what we will do in response to God's love.
Which leads to the second illustration--the party. In the story, the father and both of his sons are at the party that the father is throwing. The one son is enjoying the party, rejoicing in his new-found life and trusting in his father's version of his story. The other son rejects the celebration, unable to relinquish his grip on his own version of who he is and how things should work.
Both sons are invited to the party, but the father lets them choose whether or not they participate and enjoy it. You can't force someone to participate in and enjoy a party... that's ridiculous. By definition, if it's forced enjoyment, it isn't really enjoyment. Forced love isn't really love.

God providing us with a choice in how we respond to His love isn't cold indifference. His love necessitates our freedom. Because if we didn't have a choice, it wouldn't be love, would it?

I don't know if there will come a day when every human will decide to join the party. I don't know if there is some point in the future at which the Holy Spirit will have been embraced in the hearts of every human being and we will all respond to God's love with trust and acceptance, participating in and enjoying His forever-fiesta.

Some people firmly believe that that day will come. Others argue heatedly that that day is impossible. I say we can't know whether or not that day will come, or whether or not it is even possible (see my last post). Because what matters is whether or not we choose to trust God's version of our story, and how we respond to His love for us.

When we surrender to a love so huge and so amazing it can only come from God, then things like worship, sharing our faith, serving others, and living lives filled with grace come more naturally. And we discover that our God doesn't need to be defended, because He's bigger and more powerful than that. And we discover we don't need to figure out who is "in" and who is "out," because life with Him is about SO much more than that. And we discover that people actually want to be a part of our lives and get to know our God, because He is just that great and that loving. And there's the hope!

Hope is found in realizing that Jesus doesn't rescue us from God, but that "God is the one who rescues us from death, sin, and destruction. God is the rescuer" (pg 182). Hope is found in giving up our version of our story, and embracing God's rewritten one. Hope is found in trusting in God's love. It's found in accepting His invitation, coming to His party, and celebrating with Him--living life His way because we know He wants only the absolute best for us. Hope is found in acknowledging that there is nothing you can do or say (or not do or not say) that could take away God's love for you (see Romans 8). Hope is found in responding to God's love with a loud, "Yes! I believe that you love me, and I love you too!"

Here are some words I find especially helpful from Bell's book:
"To reject God's grace, to turn from God's love, to resist God's telling, will lead to misery. It is a form of punishment, all on its own.
This is an important distinction, because in talking about what God is like, we cannot avoid the realities of God's very essence, which is love. It can be resisted and rejected and denied and avoided, and that will bring another reality. Now, and then.
We are that free.
When people say they're tired of hearing about 'sin' and 'judgement' and 'condemnation,' it's often because those have been confused for them with the nature of God. God has no desire to inflict pain or agony on anyone.
God extends an invitation to us, and we are free to do with it as we please.
Saying yes will take us in one direction; saying no will take us in another.
God is love, and to refuse this love moves us away from it, in the other direction, and that will, by very definition, be an increasingly unloving, hellish reality.
We do ourselves great harm when we confuse the very essence of God, which is love, with the very real consequences of rejecting and resisting that love, which creates what we call hell" (pg 176-177).

I don't agree with everything Bell says in his book, but I don't agree with everything any Christian says, if I listen long enough. :P I do appreciate much of what he has to say about the nature of heaven, the nature of hell, and the nature of God. I plan to continue searching, learning, and growing as I keep getting to know God; and the more I find of God the more I realize how much more there is to explore! He is bigger than I will ever understand, and heaven, hell and salvation are more than I thought they were before (and I trust more than I understand now, as well).

Salvation is so much more than just going to heaven and avoiding hell at the end of your life. Salvation is an invitation to live life enjoying God's love for you--being constantly freed from sin, death and destruction and learning how to live in purity, joy, and grace. Like Bell explains, "Jesus calls disciples to keep entering into this shared life of peace and joy as it transforms our hearts, until it's the most natural way to live that we can imagine. Until it's second nature. Until we naturally embody and practice the kind of attitudes and actions that will go on in the age to come. A discussion about how to 'just get into heaven' has no place in the life of a disciple of Jesus because it's missing the point of it all" (pg 179).

You see, the good news IS for all people. Will everyone accept their invitation to the party, someday? I don't know. While the answer to that question is a fascinating mystery, one worth thinking about, it can't be our focus. God is about us living in His love NOW. God wins, and love wins, because God's love defeated death, symbolized by Jesus' death on the cross and His resurrection. It's more than a ticket, more than a life-raft. He rescued us with a purpose. To invite us into mind-blowing-ly awesome life. Life that is real and full of Him. A life in which we can join Him in His mission of bringing heaven to earth by living as people who are overflowing with His love.
Now that is some pretty great news. :)