Grace

I picked up Blue Like Jazz again today. (Check it out if you haven't already.) Had started it months ago after hearing the rave reviews and for whatever reason got sidetracked and put it down. A shame because Miller makes such valid points like the one I read today. Chapter 7 is entitled Grace and it hit really close to home. Growing up in a minister's home, I lived in a fishbowl with each congregant of my church watching my every move (as well as those of my brothers) just waiting for me to screw up and become the "heathen music pastor's daughter". In my mind, I only truly fulfilled that title maybe 3 or 4 times in my 18 years at that church. Sure I acted up just like every other child in the church but I only really performed seemingly "unforgivable" sins those handful of times. But as I grew up, I learned a lesson from my mother that I struggle with to this day: I must have it all together (or at least appear as such). I always felt that it was important for me to be strong for my friends, for my parents, for my church and to always take a leadership role, placing myself slightly above the other church members-in whatever area applied. I have lived in this position ever since those tender teenage years and have only recently come to understand that everybody knows I don't have it all together (although I've fooled many) just as they don't either. I've been forced to reconcile myself to the fact that when I do have it all together,I've reached the point I don't need God because when I can handle myself without Him, I refuse His love. Which is somewhat the point Miller made during his Grace chapter.

"Like Rick, I am too prideful to accept the grace of God. It isn't that I want to earn my own way to give something to God, it's that I want to earn my own way so I won't be charity." (Miller p.85)

That statement could not be any more true in my own life. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a very independent person. When I put my mind to something, it's going to get done. Period. End of story. So for me to admit that I can't get to heaven on my own, that I MUST rely on God and His FREE grace, goes completely again my innate nature. I want to be able to earn it or work for it or do something, anything to merit it. But I can't. And too many times I've allowed the enemy to steal my blessing simply because I won't humble myself enough to acknowledge (in front of others) that I need God's free, endless grace.

So today I'm saying this:
God, it's me again, Bethany. I realize I can't earn Your grace or Your love so I surrender today and give myself up to You. Take what little I have to offer and apply Your infinite love to it and use me, Lord. I am Your servant in need of mercy that I cannot win, earn or buy and I am so unworthy of such a marvelous gift. Thank you for unmerited favor. All my love belongs to You.

Blessings,
Bethany
And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace. Romans 11:6

P.S. Another passage from the same chapter that I really love:
"Rick says that I will love God because he first loved me. I will obey God because I love God. But if I cannot accept God's love , I cannot love Him in return, and I cannot obey Him. Self-discipline will never make us feel righteous or clean; accepting God's love will. The ability to accept God's unconditional grace and ferocious love is all the fuel we need to obey Him in return. Accepting God's kindness and free love is something the devil does not want us to do. If we hear, in our inner ear, a voice saying saying we are failures, we are losers, we will never amount to anything, this is the voice of Satan trying to convince the bride that the groom does not love her. This is not the voice of God. God woos us with kindness, He changes our character with the passion of His love." (Miller p. 86)