On Remaining Hidden

I could easily have kept my story hidden, or only told the parts that others would have deemed acceptable to share. But then you'd never have known the real me, only a fictional woman you and I had created in your mind.

It is Truth that sets us free.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that this has been easy for me to share. I've wrestled with it for years. I've been keenly aware of the fact that some who read will judge me harshly. But I've also come to realize that my story isn't unusual at all.  There are MANY more stories 10x more heartbreaking than mine is.

The fact is, the kinds of things I have shared with you on the blog are as common as bread.  The only difference between my story and that of millions of others is that it is being told openly and without shame.  There is one reason for that.

Jesus.

More than likely you've heard phrases like 'He is the Reason' or 'Jesus is the Reason for the Season'.  Perhaps you've heard them and quickly moved on, having had some sort of negative encounter with Christianity in the past.  Or perhaps you are a well-acquainted follower of Christ and so when you hear them you say, 'I KNOW!!' in your mind.  Either way, you may not typically spend a lot of time deliberating over what that means exactly.  I'd like to take a moment to encourage you to consider what it means.

I am able to live as a reasonably healthy adult woman simply because Jesus took me and held me close.  Over the years, Jesus has held me while he pulled back layer upon layer of shame, rejection, pain, confusion, anger, resentment, pride and so many other things.  He's been so very patient with me.  So patient that today, when I've acted like an ass, (yes, I said ass and I am a Christian woman, both at the same time) I run to Him first to get myself set straight.

Living out in the open is living in the light of truth.  That truth allows me to relate to Jesus much like Adam and Eve did in the garden.  I can walk with Him unashamed, even when I have done or thought something that someone else might think I ought to be ashamed about.

Why?

Because I am 100% confident that Jesus loves me anyway.  I know without a shadow of a doubt that when he looks at me, he's not looking at my sin.  He's looking at me through a covering that He gave me which wipes every bad mark away as soon as it tries to mar my image.  He's looking at me through the covering of His blood which does a curious thing.  His blood actually washes a person as though it were water.  It doesn't make me red, it makes me pure white, holy and clean.

If you know the Lord, then perhaps you understand what I am saying, but if you don't follow Jesus, this may seem strange.  Here are the basic facts that you need to understand.

God loved the world sooooo much that He gave the life of His dear Son Jesus to the world to pay the ultimate price that He demands for sin. That price is death.  When Jesus died on a cross over 2000 years ago, it was a sacrifice meant to appease the one true God.

Many religions require blood sacrifices so perhaps you are familiar with the idea already, but the main point is that gods get angry in most religions and they can be unpredictable and demand blood to satisfy their anger. So people kill animals and other people to give the blood to the gods. (I don't believe that other gods are true gods, but many people do and so it's important to understand what they think about these things.)

But God, the Creator of the Universe, the One True God, isn't like that.  Instead, He provided His own sacrifice.  When people did what made Him angry, He loved them anyway and offered Himself, His very own Son, to die in our place.  Now, all we need to do is recognize that we all sin, or live a life that breaks God's commands and that we need a sacrifice to pay for that. If we don't give payment to God, then we can never be with Him because He is holy and can only be in the presence of holy things.  We then simply accept the gift that Jesus, God's Son gave us when He died on the Cross.  We believe He is who He says He is and we begin living our lives in gratitude to Him for what He's done. Our payment for sin is now applied to our account.

How does that change the way we live you may ask?  It begins by learning who God is through reading the bible, through spending time with other people who follow Jesus, known as Christians.  We begin running to Him each time we are in a situation where we don't know what to do or where we act sinfully.  He then begins patiently and gently peeling back the layers until finally, we live in the light I told you about earlier. We find out from Jesus that we don't need to hide our sin anymore, or any other part of us.

If you want to know more, please leave a comment and let me know how I can reach you.

This is the MOST IMPORTANT thing I will ever tell you on this blog, please don't ignore it. Please don't remain hidden.