Daily Reading
Beyond Performance, Into Rest
One morning, I was preparing one of my lectures. John’s talk the week before had deeply touched people with the understanding of God’s grace and love for them. A friend came by the table where I was sitting in our neighborhood coffee shop and kiddingly remarked, “My husband says his life was changed after last week’s talk, so you better come up with something good.”
Part of my smaller story has been to use my gifts as a teacher and thinker to win people’s admiration—to be someone’s hero. The adversary was quickly there with reminders of past failures and the resulting pain. For a minute, I considered redoubling my efforts to come up with a good talk that week—to look up new quotes, find a really good movie clip to illustrate my points.
But this particular time, I simply listened to what my heart was telling me. It spoke to me about weariness and the fear of being found lacking; of having nothing that would make me anyone’s hero. I left the bagel shop and drove to the open space that surrounds our neighborhood. I got out and began walking, feeling deeply agitated and dejected over being trapped in such a foolish place. Anyone who has ever had the thing you depended on for life threatened will know what I am describing. I had no energy to think up prayers or even any sense of what to pray for. I began to repeat a simple sentence in my head, “Jesus, you are faithful to cleanse me from all my sins.” I did not try to exegete it or convince myself to believe it. I simply let it linger and resonate between my head and heart for whatever Jesus chose to do with it. After not many minutes, I felt something begin to break up deep down inside, a feeling of loneliness and longing acknowledged. There was a release that brought tears. I sensed that Jesus was ministering to me in a quiet and tender way, in a place years distant and much deeper in my spirit than just feelings provoked by the events of that particular morning. A sensation of freedom and well-being rose up from the very place inside that moments ago had felt such agitation.
Bringing what was happening back up into my head in order to put words to it, I can only say it was as if Jesus were telling me, “I understand your ache, Brent. I know how you’ve wanted to be someone’s hero. It’s okay. Rest in my love.” There were no words of admonishment or exhortations to try harder. I understood, in some ways for the first time, that my sin really has been cleansed by Jesus and is no longer an issue between us. I knew in my heart, in a way I perhaps hadn’t before, the depth of Jesus’ love for me on the cross. I felt like I was home.
Resting in Jesus is not applying a spiritual formula to ourselves as a kind of fix-it. It is the essence of repentance. It is letting our heart tell us where we are in our own story so that Jesus can minister to us out of the Story of his love for us. When, in a given moment, we lay down our false self and the smaller story of whatever performance has sustained us, when we give up everything else but him, we experience the freedom of knowing that he simply loves us where we are. We begin just to be, having our identity anchored in him. We begin to experience our spiritual life as the “easy yoke and light burden” Jesus tells us is his experience. We become ontologically substantive.
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Part of my smaller story has been to use my gifts as a teacher and thinker to win people’s admiration—to be someone’s hero. The adversary was quickly there with reminders of past failures and the resulting pain. For a minute, I considered redoubling my efforts to come up with a good talk that week—to look up new quotes, find a really good movie clip to illustrate my points.
But this particular time, I simply listened to what my heart was telling me. It spoke to me about weariness and the fear of being found lacking; of having nothing that would make me anyone’s hero. I left the bagel shop and drove to the open space that surrounds our neighborhood. I got out and began walking, feeling deeply agitated and dejected over being trapped in such a foolish place. Anyone who has ever had the thing you depended on for life threatened will know what I am describing. I had no energy to think up prayers or even any sense of what to pray for. I began to repeat a simple sentence in my head, “Jesus, you are faithful to cleanse me from all my sins.” I did not try to exegete it or convince myself to believe it. I simply let it linger and resonate between my head and heart for whatever Jesus chose to do with it. After not many minutes, I felt something begin to break up deep down inside, a feeling of loneliness and longing acknowledged. There was a release that brought tears. I sensed that Jesus was ministering to me in a quiet and tender way, in a place years distant and much deeper in my spirit than just feelings provoked by the events of that particular morning. A sensation of freedom and well-being rose up from the very place inside that moments ago had felt such agitation.
Bringing what was happening back up into my head in order to put words to it, I can only say it was as if Jesus were telling me, “I understand your ache, Brent. I know how you’ve wanted to be someone’s hero. It’s okay. Rest in my love.” There were no words of admonishment or exhortations to try harder. I understood, in some ways for the first time, that my sin really has been cleansed by Jesus and is no longer an issue between us. I knew in my heart, in a way I perhaps hadn’t before, the depth of Jesus’ love for me on the cross. I felt like I was home.
Resting in Jesus is not applying a spiritual formula to ourselves as a kind of fix-it. It is the essence of repentance. It is letting our heart tell us where we are in our own story so that Jesus can minister to us out of the Story of his love for us. When, in a given moment, we lay down our false self and the smaller story of whatever performance has sustained us, when we give up everything else but him, we experience the freedom of knowing that he simply loves us where we are. We begin just to be, having our identity anchored in him. We begin to experience our spiritual life as the “easy yoke and light burden” Jesus tells us is his experience. We become ontologically substantive.
Want More? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today