redemption blasting.

i wrote a post two days ago about redemption calling, and today i want to expand on that a little more and talk about it blasting.

because sometimes God's grace is like an anvil to the face.

(i so did not realize i had my rhyming hat when i wrote that previous sentence. holla. also, i am now rapping that sentence in my head. & if i were on twitter i would hashtag this detroitprobz.

but i'm not, so moving on.)

i don't remember if i've mentioned this on the blog before or not - and even if i had, it would have been a while - but there is one book, ever, that has made me cry. but cry i mean i had to shut the book and put it on the floor just so i could sob properly. those of you who know me well know i am not a crier. i'm not one to wear my heart on my sleeve, or anywhere else than safely protected within my rib cage.

there's a lot, most of which is a muddle of emotions and life, which led to the great disillusionment and apathy i experienced in my late teens. and after over a year of solid anger and bitterness, this book crashed through and reminded me, just maybe, my life, albeit mine, wasn't about me.

it's kind of like being the ocean floor, thinking you're impenetrable, and an anchor slams into you, cracking you wide open. except it's not any anchor, it's the Anchor, and the breath is knocked sure out of you and you're just gasping, "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus." whatever fire you've built underneath that seemingly solid stone is whooshed out, drenched with the water spilling in from the cracks the Anchor's made. and the bitterness, slowly, begins to be washed sure away.

it's that moment i refer back to when i think about why i'm following Jesus now, how even when apathy finds me here, it's nothing like what it used to be. there's a sure foundation now there wasn't before.

i almost wasn't here, writing to you. i almost wasn't trying to fight the good fight, to run well the race of endurance. i've never put it so starkly, but i almost wasn't a christian.

i look back at all that mess - my favorite phrase, hot mess, is too light to even describe how crazy and messy it was - and i think, "God has saved me from so much. so much. i can't even begin to fathom how much work went into redeeming all that crazy."

sometimes He will blast you wide open. because our ocean floor of a heart is more like an oyster shell, and we're nursing secret, deep pain.

but Jesus wants to turn it into a pearl.

i have no great testimony. i became a christian at the age of 5 and rededicated my life at ages 13 and 19. i'm starting to hate saying the latter part because i feel i'm rededicating my life every day now; every moment i live is a moment in which i have to choose Jesus and life over hell and death. i almost walked life completely without Jesus and i am telling you sure as i love dessert, it is sheer hell. so for those who have been redeemed of seemingly greater sins, i am sure they would tell you by choosing Jesus, they have chosen the better way. a narrower, harder way, but better.

because He takes all that yuck, all that oystery pain, and He molds it, molds us, into pearls of great worth. and He, like the man in the parable He tells, gave everything up to purchase that pearl. you are that pearl. your story is that pearl. you have been purchased and redeemed from a lifetime of slavery and sin.

i'm praying desperately we learn how to live that. i'm praying desperately we learn to live without defeat and darkness holding us back in chains that Jesus already freed us from, chains that like phantom pain feel acutely real but are deceivingly false.

let the Anchor slam and redemption blast. i'm ready for a revolution of light.