Finding Jesus

“But what about you?” He asked, “Who do you say I am?” Matthew 16:15 NIV

A question that surely penetrates a heart if it is considered truthfully and in all sincerity. How easy it is to rhyme off the rote answers we’ve collected reading our Bibles, listening to Pastors and Teachers deliver heart-tugging sermons and hanging with other Christians who have been given answers that they now consider “textbook.” Put me in a room of seasoned Christians, and with them, I’ll raise a hallelujah but meet me in my home or office, driving my car or walking on the street, you might meet the real me – the one who still struggles to shape my life in response to a love that I can’t comprehend.

If you ask me that question and carefully measure my answers against the life I live, you’ll see that there is a significant chasm that separates my words and my actions. Don’t dig too deep, though. I wouldn’t want you to discover the imposter in me, the other ‘guy’ who pretends all is well while his heart agonizes, trying to believe that I am all that our Lord says I am.

If He asks the question, however, the imposter has no place to hide. I can’t pretend all is well because I know His spirit inside of me knows my entire life story: all the skeletons in my closet, every sin I’ve ever committed, all the times I’ve deceived others and manipulated them to gain a personal advantage and of course all of my degraded endeavors to love others – seeking to get for me rather than give to them.

While all that spiritual warfare rages inside me, my guilt reminds me of my shallow faith, my feeble prayer life, and inconsistent discipleship that longs to serve my King. If that wasn’t enough, there are then my struggles of dying to self and fighting for rebirth. Of struggling under the weight of my fears of rejection, a self-loathing that tries to tell me I will never be enough, and the gloom and despair during the times when I feel alone and abandoned – believing that I have no choice but to carry on by myself.

I can’t answer that question, Lord. Perhaps a better question for today should come from me to You: “who do You say I am?” I have heard of Your great name and the deeds of Your hands, but I still don’t know who I am or where I fit into the majesty and mystery of all You are. Will You help me discover “the me” in me that you created?

As I pause and consider all that, one thing that I know with certainty is that God never changes. I haven’t encountered any conditions in my journey with Him, and I accept that His way is absolute. I surrender in my acknowledgement that the change needs to happen within me. I shudder a little as I consider my commitment to learning to trust that He will love me just as I am – forcing my poser to reveal himself and stand with me and live loved that I might fully surrender to His holiness? There would definitely be death and resurrection in that journey.

As I considered Heartstrong, I realized that it is a step in the journey I must eventually take. It promises hope for spiritual growth, self-examination, and opportunities to develop my spirit to become more attuned with heavenly things and become more like Jesus. Walking this journey with others opens doors to others’ hearts, shared testimonies of encounters and healings, encouragement and opportunities to put our faith in practice to serve others in their time of need. I really, really want that.

If you’re reading this, you’ve likely signed up for the journey. Come, take my hand and let’s walk together, that we might encounter the Lord on our road to Damascus.

I leave you with this prayer as we embark on our journey into the Kingdom of Heaven, here on earth.

Dear Lord: let us come to You here in a posture of prayer, afraid because we are naked and have for so long hid ourselves from You by pretending to be another. We embark on this 6-month journey, prayerful that You see us, childlike – simple and without form – as an empty vessel waiting to be filled by its maker. We do so expectantly, asking to receive new mercies every morning and grace upon grace.

We come before You today with the nugget of faith we’ve been portioned and ask that we be delivered from pose and pretense and the impulse to pick up our fig leaf and run back into hiding. We seek You in Your sanctuary, longing to momentarily forget about ourselves, praying instead for the peace that You promised would come when You lay Your yoke fully upon us and grant us rest.

We want to believe that we are who You say we are, Lord. Help our unbelief; we pray.