Dark Heart

I am so tired of my sin nature. I am tired of the same sins plaguing me year after year. I am tired of seeing the sins and weaknesses of my parents repeat in my own life. I am tired of seeing the marks on my emotions left by someone else’s sin. I am tired of the fight. With Paul I cry out, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” I feel that death, that sin, at work throughout my whole being; there is nothing it has not touched. It lives in my best impulses, my deepest desires. It colors not only the anger and hate in my life, but even my love. It doesn’t simply cling to me, it is me.

I want Life. I long for joy and peace and comfort. I want to love and be loved. I do not want to be alone. How can the God of Light, the God of life and joy and peace and comfort, tolerate the darkness that is inside of me? How can He possibly bear to shine that light on, and even inside of, this body of death that is me? What does He see there? How can He bear it?

I can do nothing but fall to the ground and weep before Him. I am nothing, I have nothing; there is only sin and death and darkness. Please Lord, I cannot survive Your Presence; but I cannot flee. The Light attracts me, it calls me, it holds me. I wait for Him to turn in disgust and fling me from Himself.

Yet He does not turn from me. He does not send me away. He touches me. He lifts my head. He forces me to look into His eyes. How can that be? How can He look on me that way? How can there be Love there? How can it be anything but loathing, or at best pity? But no, it is Love. I do not understand.

Scarred hands lift me up. They wipe my tears. They heal my hurts. They take my sin. Oh God, no! I am not worth that price! But the Lamb lies there, slain. Blood covers the white wool. My hands are covered with it, my body is splattered with it; I have been baptized in the Lamb’s blood. It is heartrending. God continues to look at me with love in His eyes. I look at the Lamb, at His Blood, at His eyes; they also look on me with love. He stands beside me, once again lifting me up with scarred hands. He breathes on me. A spark of light finds its way into my heart and brings life to my dead soul. The slain Lamb lives, and so do I.

I still do not understand. I do not know why. Why would God want me at all? He knows the foulest part of me, yet He died rather than hurl me from His Presence. He covered me with His own precious Blood. He breathed life into me, He left His own Spirit in my heart; a spark of Light living in sinful flesh.

Is it possible that I could in some way bring glory to God? Could I possibly bring Him joy? Will the spark of Light that is Him shine through this darkness that is me?

©Rebecca A Givens, 06/12/10