Good Enough

All that misses the mark is evil. I missed the mark, trying my hardest. Through tremendous difficulty, I did my very best to love, to hang on, to do right no matter what. And I got creamed. All my best efforts (not my worst!) turned to ashes in my fingers. Not only that, I myself got worse and worse off. Life slammed me. I got more and more frustrated, and sicker and sicker. There was no relief in sight. For the life of me, I could not see a way to break the conundrum.

I finally found myself in a twelve step program. Sitting there, hearing my story come out of so many others’ mouths, the light slowly began to dawn. The cracks in the armor of what had been up until that point a perfect crime in my life began to show themselves. What was I possibly doing wrong?

I began to see that it was I myself that was creating the edges and limits of my reality: not others or G-d. I was the one making the rules of the game I was playing, and He was letting me. I was the one who was attempting to define what love ‘should’ look like, and I was the one who was attempting to be the source of that love. Was I ‘doing’ anything wrong? Nope. My actions were correct. My motives were correct. I knew the Law. But, I began to realize that in the effort to accomplish love in my own strength, which no one can do, there was a missing link, and that missing link was the POWER to actually accomplish the goal, the mark, of the high calling. Not only were my efforts laughable, they were not getting the benediction, the blessing, of Heaven. Not once did I feel that I was getting backed up, reinforced or rewarded with success. Not once did love work out for me! I was failing at love!

What was my mistake? I did not have a working relationship with the Source of Love; the POWER of Love. I found, at the very outer edges of the yetzer ha-ra what no one could have ever told me; that I cannot manufacture love. I can see it, want it, define it correctly, and desire to do it, but that is not enough. I still have to be plugged into the Wall. Love comes from beyond me.

My best efforts were only doing what Skip listed above. I was, with my very best efforts, still only RESULTING in bringing sorrow and causing unhappiness. Yep. I was being quite unsuccessful, for sure, and was certainly being unattractive (pitiable is more like it!), unlucky, worthless (oh, I felt that one!) and, last but not least, I was being disobedient, but for the life of me I could not see how! Oh, I was being “poneros”. There’s finally a word for me! Thank you! I was being disobedient because what I was told to do was have a relationship with my Father, and that was not happening. I knew that was not happening, but I did not see WHY it was not happening, because I could not see the stinking thinking that was preventing me from enjoying that fellowship. I was not free to relate to my Maker because I was bound by incorrect beliefs about Him, myself, others, and about love, too. I had fallen for lies that were informing those beliefs that were preventing me from reaching out and actually touching. I was a wretch, lost in a world that I had created, or at least acceded to, and I had lost the keys.

I was believing accusing things about G-d, myself and others that were not true. I had accumulated those rotten beliefs along the way from my experiences, from how others had acted or treated me, from the example of others, from what I had been told was true: also, in my weak moments, some of that stinking thinking had just jumped on me and, in my isolation, I had no strength to keep it out, even though I recognized it as wrong, and, once it was in, I did not know how to get it back out (and, no, the answer was NOT more efforts by me!)

I desperately needed an education on HOW to recognize false beliefs and HOW to protect myself against the accusation that engendered them. I also needed to be taught what to do with the places in my life that were characterized by a lack of faith, which were exactly those places in which the yetzer ha-ra (ego?) felt it had to step up to bat. When I listen to the Accuser, the result is always going to be a loss of faith in G-d, myself, or others. Rotten beliefs that are the fruit of those accusations are beliefs in which can be found no faith in Him, myself or others. If I am not walking in faith, I am going to walking in sin. Stinking thinking is all about trust, or the lack thereof. If Christians have lost the full sense of what this really means, then perhaps even the stones may have to cry out. If we think faith is about some abstract doctrine, then the world may end up knowing better than we do. Ask most any up-and-coming youngin these days what creates the conditions of poneros (love the new word!), and they will very likely turn around and say “oh, you mean that person has TRUST ISSUES”. Oh, yes. Out of the mouths of babes. Its going to start to get embarrassing for the Christian world here pretty soon if we can’t start waking up and seeing what the world can see. The world is motivated by the question “why isn’t it working out?” The answers are promised to all sincere seekers and askers. Shouldn’t we be the first to be asking “Why is there poneros?” instead of just thinking we already know, or, worse, attempting to make up a bunch of abstract or even doctrinal reasons why that mark is getting missed?

Thank you for this post Skip. It makes me happy to hear that you and Rosann are going on vacation. I pray it will be refreshing.

So glad you and Rosanne are getting away! Be blessed and be refreshed. We will be thinking about you.