Letting ourselves be loved when we are most unworthy of love

It seems that Jesus did not always follow the rules.

Of course, He followed the unchanging law of God, but He did not always follow the rules made by man. He allowed His disciples to pick wheat to eat on a Sabbath. He also healed on the Sabbath. He ate with known sinners and allowed them to touch Him. He was not – IS not– limited by the rules set by human standards. No, Jesus always followed the need of people, not the rules set by them. He made His judgments not by outward appearances, but according to the sincerity of the heart.

We, of course, cannot see the heart as clearly, and we know our own hearts only imperfectly, and so we have a tendency to become “legalistic” in our following Christ. And this kind of legalism can lead to scrupulosity – because on our own, given our fallen nature, we can never do anything perfectly, and when we place too much emphasis on the external appearance or the mechanical adherence, we see only how we are acting, and how imperfectly we adhere! This vision of our unworthiness logically stirs up fear that we will never be good enough. But perfect love casts out fear.

Ah, there's the rub. We do not know love.

God is pure Love. Pure Love only wants what is best for others, and seeks ways to draw them to it. God is a good Father, a tender Father, a gentle Father. A Father who keeps His promises, and only wants us to return love for love. A Father who guards our every step, who forgets absolutely nothing but our sin - He forgets not one joy, not one pain, not one prayer, not one sigh. He is a Father who longs to hear us call Him by that familial word: "Father." This is not just pious rhetoric. This is very real; He longs to dwell with us, and not dwell on our sin. He provides every good thing for His children; He is constantly drawing His children to Himself (and we are all children when it comes to going home) in spite of our ingratitude and stubbornness. He is all mercy and compassion and love.

"Come to Me," He says to each of us.
Always, He says, “Come.”

If we could spend just five minutes every day simply "being" with God as His child, acknowledging Him as Father, not allowing our past sin to get in the way, we might make progress here.

Just be with your Father.
Know that He loves you.
HE loves you.
He LOVES you.
He loves YOU.

Of COURSE we're imperfect, of COURSE we're unworthy, of COURSE we have sinned today. And yesterday. And tomorrow. And probably until five minutes after we assume room temperature. Of course. That’s what the Sacrament of Reconciliation is for: reconciling. Perfection is God’s business; ours is just the trying.

We are fallen creatures. He loves us anyway. He wants to do the work for us, but He can't work if we're working too hard or making our own rules. Our work is in the surrendering, the admitting our imperfection and inability to perfect ourselves, our allowing Him to work in us.

We just have to say, "Yes."

We have to stop slipping into the kind of self-judgment that paralyzes us and keeps us from standing in His Presence. We have to stop ourselves in the tracks of perfectionist thoughts and say, "Jesus, I believe in Your love for me." We acknowledge our wrongs, our difficulties, our bad habits, and we know that our hope is in His unfailing mercy and love. We see what we are and we give it all to Him and allow Him to transform us.

This was the difference between Judas and Peter. They had both been chosen by Jesus, had traveled with Him, heard Him speak countless times. And they both betrayed Him. But Judas refused to accept the forgiveness he needed; letting oneself be loved when one is most unworthy of love takes great humility. Judas despaired because He did not trust in Christ’s forgiveness. Peter, on the other hand, wept bitterly and begged forgiveness; He trusted in the power of Christ’s love to overcome his own weakness. And he remained first among the Apostles.

We must have this same trust (it took Peter quite some time to learn it, so we must be patient with ourselves as well!). We have to be more certain of Christ’s love than we are of our own misery and sin. We must let Him judge.

Ask Him to make you what He wants you to be. Just keep trying to choose the best thing and leave the rest to Him. What's past is past. We only have right now to do what He wants, to love Him and love others. Imperfectly.

And that’s all He wants.

There is in us love that we do not know exists until we are called beyond ourselves and asked to give. Simon of Cyrene did not know what he was capable of, nor to what he was called, when the soldiers forced him to help this Nazarene get His cross up the hill. He wanted to stay out of it; he did not want to expose himself to the suffering of this criminal. But Jesus, weak and on His way to death, welcomed him and was grateful for Simon’s help. What precisely this opened up within the Cyrenian we do not know. But we do know that he became a believer, and his sons as well.

We are all Simon. We are all called beyond ourselves to help one another, not hide from the suffering around us. When we respond to this call, we do not know what will be opened up within us, but no self-gift fails to enlarge us for greater things.

And the more we give, the more we will find that greater capacities for love are opened up within us. The more we conform ourselves to the self-giving of Christ, the more we become our true selves.

Because by His wounds of love, we are healed.
Healed of sin, we are freed to love fully.
And in sacrificing ourselves for love of others, infinite capacities for love are opened up within us.

It is this infinite capacity for love that is our eternal destiny.

~excerpted from: "His Suffering and Ours - words for pierced and wounded hearts,"
available now directly from the publisher at http://www.lulu.com/kathryntherese

My parchment heart strains
toward Him who burns
with love for me, just beyond my reach -
one wavelength beyond my ear or eye.

My every sense empty, aching for You
alone, so that I refuse them
every other satisfaction.

My soul, expanded with Your love,
stands vacant, waiting
for Your return.

Empty, my burning hunger grows
and I wait for You at prayer.

Then I rise to seek Your Face,
Your will,
in every need and heart around me.

To Everyman, Abrupted

When will we reach for what is truest, what is at the
depths of what we are?
When will we stop running and listen to the
voice that is calling to us?
There is a Fatherhood that animates our being,
but you want to belong to yourself –
to hold on to yourself, you must
refuse every thing that needs a part of you;
you must cling tenaciously to you –
and how will you hold all of us,
with both hands
already full?
When will you let go and be free of loneliness?
We are earthen vessels, yes, but the elemental dust
from which we are made came from brilliant stars,
and still holds the capacity for fire.
When will you let yourself be warmed by this
flame within you?
It is in your bones, a breath from burning.

Will you surrender yourself to this birth into fatherhood’s fullness?
You must open both eyes to that radiance that is
father-child-love, and accept that you are both
father and child.
So why choose to remain alone?
When will you allow my love to open up in you
that place where you can embrace the fatherhood you cannot see?

When will you descend to that place from which
you can be lifted?
You must acknowledge the chasm between
what you think you will make of yourself and
what you are made to be.
When will the Father’s light -
creeping in gently from the bottom,
never denying our freedom, but always holding hope –
When will this deep light overcome your resistance to the
truth of what we are?
Admit that you will die and then you can begin to live!
Admit that I will die and then you will permit me to live.
When will you cease this solitary struggle?
Will you reach into me and breathe this light that
is not mine? Or will you only touch
the surface and
remain in darkness?
This light is bursting out toward you,
but you must open your hands to receive it.
You must let go and breathe it in deeply.

When will we speak of what is at the depths of you and me?
It waits to be wrapped in our words and discovered,
to be fanned out between us and
surround us with its
light until we
stand silent,
facing the truths too true
to be spoken or signed.

I am here, aching for you to know all of me and to still
accept me as yours –
to give me the gift of being known and yet loved! –
but you content yourself with shells and shibboleths.
I am here, aching to know all of you
and to prove to you that I will still accept you as gift –
but you cannot tell me what you do not know.
I am still here. Is our love to be measured in tears?
I am still here, offering. Is fatigue the measure of our love then?
When will you concede that you are the expression of the
Father,
that you do not express yourself only?

In us, the truth is embedded.
We must desire to know it,
work to free it so it can free us,
and then we must
ACT.

-from "His Suffering and Ours - words of hope for pierced and wounded hearts,"
now available at http://www.lulu.com/kathryntherese