The Story

I will never fully understand the depth of Jesus' grace toward me. I still do not understand why he hung there on that cross for me. What on earth did he have to gain?

What I do understand is the feeling of gratitude and humility that comes with scraping the surface of that understanding of grace - the incredible sense of naked, shameless glory that flows from that wooden cross and covers everything I've ever done, thought, imagined or said. I understand what it feels like to be clean. And to stand in the presence of a holiness that I cannot even fully comprehend. There is freedom there, in that sense of your own smallness, your filth, your inability to measure up.

Someday, I hope that I get to have the opportunity to share my story. My real Gospel story. It's not one that many people know, not even in my own family. But I hope that someday I get the chance and the strength to stand up and tell everyone what Jesus has done - without shame and guilt, without fear. I hope that someday I get the chance to tell someone in that situation that there is hope, that there is a way out, that there is another life. That there are choices. That it will not be easy - it will be excruciating - but that it is worth it. That I get to end my story by pointing at Him and say, "This man - this man is the reason for all that I am. This man is the answer and redemption you are so desperately begging for." Some say we are in denial, and I would say that is true. The life we are called to live is one of daily denial - denial of that which comes most naturally in favor of obedience. I want to be a slave to Jesus Christ - because as his slave I will never be more free.

There was once a time when I was afraid to tell my story to anyone. Now I am afraid to tell my story to everyone. What would it look like to live that way?

I want to be used to tell His story, even if it's only in some small way. I want to see someone else set free from the prison I once lived in. Please - if only once, if only for some short moment before I die - let me see the fruit of my life's testament to You. And let that testament be glorifying of the One who is the Deliverer, the Redeemer, the Author and Perfecter, and the Way.

What I hope is the final stretch of this road is beginning. Old wounds will be reopened. We lie to ourselves when we say that time heals all wounds; it doesn't. It only presses a "pause" button. And that is why, in some ways, I never made it past first grade. This road will require going back as far as I can, to the time and place where everything started.

It is a poetic irony that, so often, we must go back to the beginning in order to reach the end.