Saturday, May 26, 2007

two hours on a plane...

Right now, it's about 10:00 am, and I'm sitting in my brother's apartment. I've run errands this morning, dropped off laundry, been to the store, and I love it.

I could TOTALLY be a New Yorker.

Last night on the plane, I started re-reading a book I read a few years ago. It's called Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning. After reading just a few pages, I came to the humbling realization that I am not the same woman that read that book two years ago.

I am changed.

I am not saying that to be conceited or arrogant, but I remember how humbling it was to read that book the first time, and how it made me feel emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. I remember the challenge alone of the title, how trust is to the core one of the hardest things we will ever deal with, and that THE truth, God's truth, is something that can be so difficult to grasp, but so vital and crucial to what being a believer is.

Maybe the realization I came to one the plane was that, in spite of everything, I do trust. I have to trust with reckless abandon to everything I know to be stable and in control, because my perception of control is not God's. God's ways are not my ways. That is an absolute. And yet, I still trust.

"Wallowing in shame, remorse, self-hatred, and guilt over real or imagined failings in our past lives betrays a distrust in the love of God. It shows that we have not accepted the acceptance of Jesus Christ and thus have rejected the total sufficiency of his redeeming work. Preoccupation with our past sins, present weaknesses, and character defects gets our emotions churning in self-destructive ways, closes us within the mighty citadel of self, and preempts the presence of a compassionate God." Brennan Manning

"Trust is our gift back to God, and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for the love of it." Brennan Manning

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