Tuesday, November 22, 2022 My Story, Part 8

I’ve gotta tell you, the word “sinner” always really stuck in my craw. It made me bristle with indignation. It’s just religious guilt-mongering, I thought to myself. On top of that, I was a nice person – not perfect, mind you, but a very decent human being. So one day I threw the gauntlet down to God in a prayer that was so filled with hubris, I’m surprised I wasn’t struck down on the spot. “If I’m a sinner, God, you’re going to have to show it to me because I just don’t see it.” This was probably one of the most swiftly-answered prayers of my life. The scales were removed from my eyes and over the next 24 hours I saw what He saw: a deceiver of people, a manipulator of emotions, an out-and-out liar, an irresponsible and selfish creep. I had been on a binge which could be titled “The immediate gratification of all my whims and desires.” There’s no need here to go into detail of all the sins that paraded before me; suffice it to say that a very stiff wind had just blown through and whisked away all my pretensions. I had been corrected, educated, rebuked and humbled. I was (and am) a sinner.

Wouldn’t you think that was the end of the story? Don’t underestimate my double-mindedness, my desire to be counted as wise in the world’s eyes. And still struggling with compulsive binging and overeating, I was also bargaining with God: “You fix this problem and I’ll love you.” In fact, I really wanted Him to use that area of my life to prove Himself to me. I wrote: “I need something concrete to hang on to, or I find it impossible to justify all this madness. But how could it be madness? Am I saying that half of the world is insane? No, I’m saying that I am insane.”

And so it went: back and forth, back and forth. I chided myself to “Let go and let God!” Sometimes it seemed like me and God were really connecting. But I knew I was holding back. I copied Matthew 17:20 in my journal: “If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.” I wrote underneath it: “Lord, I am the mountain. Move me.”

Reading more of the Bible, I came across Isaiah 40:31 and also copied it into my journal: “They who wait for the Lord shall RENEW their strength, they shall MOUNT UP like EAGLES, they shall RUN and NOT be weary; they shall WALK AND NOT FAINT.” (Yes, I capitalized all those words) and underneath it, another poem:

I followed a slow sidewalk
Like an angry windswept story
Scurrying with dried-up leaves
Til everything was still
And I could clearly hear my anguish.

I’m tired of trying to love you
When I fail either with or without
Your hand in mine.
I can be stubborn, too
And stare into the evening eyes
With defiance and with longing
And with desperation.

No one answered
And still I waited, trying
To be one of them who
WAITS FOR THE LORD.
For a long time now
I’ve been waiting
But not without stamping feet
And curses of a child.

Do you still love
A spoiled child…
Even on the worst days?

My Story Part 1
My Story Part 2
My Story Part 3
My Story Part 4
My Story Part 5
My Story Part 6
My Story Part 7
My Story Part 9
My Story Part 10

This blog post will be swept away by a very stiff wind in the morning.