Love Laid Bare

I've been reading a book lately - the kind you take with you everywhere, the kind that travels from your purse, to your car, to coffee shops and beyond. I might share more on it later, but the reason I bring it up is because one of the chapters in that book brought me to a realization that I don't want to forget. The sort of realization that I already knew, but it had been awhile since the truth of it really sunk in again. And it's this: a relationship with God requires complete, total, unabashed honesty.

In a sense, it's obvious. We know this. We know that God can see everything in our hearts already, and we know that we should be honest with Him in all things. But I'm not sure we really live like we know it all the time. At least I don't. So often, if I'm struggling with something, I run right back to the age old coping mechanism of trying to hide it from God. Of course, I know He knows. And He knows that I know He knows (ok, I'll stop there). But my way of "hiding" something from Him is to simply not talk about it with Him. I think, God, I will talk to you about the things that are going "right" between us, and you can just leave the other stuff for me to deal with on my own.

It's a pretty stupid strategy, isn't it? But as I was reading in that chapter how silly it is to avoid bringing up these things to God, it suddenly hit me that it's exactly the same as our real relationships with one another. Take marriage, for example. I'm not married, but I do know that a successful marriage requires honesty. It requires you to bring up the things that are bothering you, to be honest about your flaws and weaknesses, and to talk about them openly with one another, without fear of rejection.

And that is exactly how we should approach our relationship with God. It is such a healthy thing, in our earthly relationships, to lay it all out on the table. The good, and the bad. To say, these are the areas in which I struggle, this is where I've messed up, and I don't want to hide it from you. So why wouldn't we do that with God?

This is the incredible thing about God: not only does He already know about these things, but He is not phased by them. He's not in shock. He actually longs for us to be honest about these areas of brokenness and hurt and sin to Him, because it's only He who can bring true healing to them. The more we avoid talking to Him about these things, the more we prolong our healing. Not only that, I think we also risk letting them become strongholds in our lives. The enemy can work very well with the things we keep "hidden," just out of God's reach, because we're too ashamed to talk about them. But once we bring them out into the light, once we say, God, here is all the ways I've messed up in this area, speak to me about it, tell me why I'm struggling, help me overcome this, we take that power from the enemy.

True intimacy requires true honesty. And you know, it's such an incredibly beautiful thing. I always know God sees all of me, flaws and all, but something truly incredible happens when I can talk about all of it with Him. When I know that He's not going to turn me away because I am broken and struggling. When I realize that He still loves me and has great plans for me, and we can still have a relationship full of joy and peace and laughter, even as He helps me work through the issues of my heart.

This realization makes me want to bring it all to Him. Makes me want to talk about all of it - the good, the bad and the ugly. You know, God is so incredible because He really does accept us fully as we are. Does He want us to rise higher, and will He correct us if necessary? Yes, of course. As any good father would. But all our brokenness doesn't make Him accept us any less. It's actually all part of the adventure of a relationship with Him, all part of the beauty and the meaning of having Him as our heavenly father. Together, we can work on these issues of our hearts. It's a rather lonely, ineffective thing to try to do it on our own after all.

#christian