The L-Word

A girlfriend told me yesterday that she just knew God was not happy with her for her divorce situation.

A few years ago, I would have agreed with her, and I may have even been one to offer that statement.  I wonder how many readers have that same belief; that the miraculous powerful creator of this universe is MAD, or DISAPPOINTED in us?

As soon as she spoke the words, “God….not happy……me,” I felt heat rise up inside me.  Anger not directed at her, but anger in her defense.  Anger at the idea of legalism and my personal experience with it.  Legalism (I called it the “L-Word”) taught me to be good little Christian girl and do all the right things so that I would be in good standing with God.  Then I just knew that he would bless me, and I would be happy.  Legalism led me to the guilt, then spiraled me into devastating SHAME.  Shame introduced me to addictions, depression,  and suicidal tendencies to name a few.  The illusion I had  of God because of legalism and false teaching  in my childhood led me down a path of destruction.  Shockingly,  growing up in the church all my life brought me to a  space (a few years back)  where I felt my only answer in life was to end it.

How could that be?  What did I miss?  What I missed was a simple principle that was not talked about much.

Love

Love was the thing I never heard  about.  In my  opinion, that would have really screwed up the whole  “control thing.”   I mean, if you know about the New Testament, that “love” thing sure did freak out those Pharisees back when Jesus walked around living out love.

I didn’t know of this love.  Curriculum in the SBC was that we had to know all the stories and facts.  Sermons were preached about “asking Jesus into my heart” or go to hell forever.   THAT was the God of my childhood.  The illusion was that if I was bad, God punished.  For this reason alone I did not have sex until my wedding night,  drink until I was 21, always kept curfew,  and never went behind my parents back.  I was what my high school friends called a “goody goody.”  I did all the right things but not for the right reasons.  Fear ruled my decisions.   LEGALISM…..  The L-Word.  I was afraid God would get mad at me and punish me for having sex before marriage.  I feared the wrath of my parents worse than the wrath of God when it came to drinking and curfew.  So out of fear, I maintained my purity.

Living in fear and lack of any understanding of love brought me to crisis.  At the end of my marriage 7 years ago, as I began to seek truth, and question what I had been spoon fed.... I had a mini-breakdown, and a year later an all out nervous breakdown.  My belief system completely deconstructed, I made some not so “goody goody” choices.  In that muck and mire, I met God.  For the first time in my life, I met Him and I saw Him.  What  I discovered  was that He is nothing like the God of my childhood.

LOVE

He is LOVE and  incapable of being disappointed, angry, or even thinking about me in any way other than the thought of, “I love you.”   He cannot be love and be accusing.  In fact, the accuser and guilt giver is actually the enemy of our soul… Satan himself.  Scriptures plainly state, “there is no condemnation in Christ.”  There are consequences in life ( I know about some of those), but not because he gives them.  Consequences are a natural order of the universe….  It grieves God when we make choices that are not his heart and best for us, only because HE is LOVE.  He knows what the road holds.   Unwanted pregnancies, broken families, addictions are just a few consequences from unwise choices.  But they are not because of an impersonal God in the clouds up there is just waiting for us to mess it all up so he can dish out a punishment.  The enemy of our soul wants us to believe it.

DONT ……

It is a Lie.  It is legalism….  How about we adopt a new L-Word.

LOVE.

Let’s all receive the love from the creator of the universe.  He loves us all so much.  Once we get that, really receive it into our hearts, then………. we are truly able to LOVE ourselves, and then LOVE others