Should I stay or should I go now?

While waiting for a client to show up, I pulled out my handy dandy work phone equipped with the world wide web. My confession: I haven’t picked up the Bible in a few months. I’ve been reading The Ragamuffin Gospel and Blue Like Jazz every now and again, but never from the source of it all. So today I broke the separation.

I didn’t know what to read and the phone’s screen is so tiny, but Philippians just seemed to call my name. Impatient and without my stylus, I just decided to start at the beginning. Chapter 1. So I’m reading and reading and am reminded about how much Paul was an amazing character. I mean, who else is happy that he is in chains for Christ? “Hey guys! I cannot see my family, I’ve got these cuffs on my arms, and I have no idea when I will get out of this place. But I have Jesus. And I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.” Oh, that crazy Paul.

But the passage that grabbed a hold of me was Philippians 1:21-26.

For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, so that through my being with you again your boasting in Christ Jesus will abound on account of me.

I don’t know why I’ve never really paid attention to those verses before, maybe so I could appreciate them now, but what Christian has never said, “I wish I could just die right now and go to Heaven and be with the Lord. Away from sin, away from pain, away from fear…” But this Paul guy. He’s madwhack. He knows to be in Heaven is “better by far,” but he chooses to stick around and continue with his “fruitful labor.” Why? Because He loves Christ so much, Paul wants to let everyone - and I mean everyone - know about his love for the Lord and the Lord’s love for him. No matter the cost.

I sometimes wonder why I came out of my car wreck laughing instead of compacted with the rest of my Mustang. And honestly, there are few times that I wish I was compacted. At that point in my life, all was good, me and God were pretty tight, I had amazing sisters in Christ that built me up, and I could’ve ended on a good note. But here I am. Troubled little Nina in a little valley wanting desperately to be on top of the hill again, wanting desperately to take my friends up with me too…

I guess in a way, I feel tied down in chains. But I can’t let that stop me from loving God and spreading the Truth.

That’s a thinker.

I started reading The Ragamuffin Gospel because all my friends had told me about what a good book it was a few years back. People would ask for it all the time when I worked at Family Christian. So now, years later, I decided to hop on the bandwagon and get to reading it. I’ve only read the first chapter, but I couldn’t go any further. What Brendan Manning touched upon was simply too much for my feeble mind to digest. It’s always been something my mind and heart could never fully grasp.

Grace.

Manning mentioned how we throw around the word “grace” nowadays. I can’t imagine I’d argue with that, I always talk about how the word “love” and “hate” are thrown around without people really understanding how powerful those words are. I think the word “grace” is probably just as powerful, huh? And just how powerful is grace?

As hard as I try to fight legalism, I always end up back to where I started. Making life into one big chart, the ones we had in elementary school where if you had enough checkmarks at the end of the list, you got an Atomic Fireball. Well, on my big chart, prizes include love, meaningful relationships, and eternal life. Everytime I run into a problem in my life, I can always trace it back to me just wanting to work for what I’ve got. Call it my hardworking Asian ethics, but I guess I like that extra zing I get when I reach that temporary peak of happiness, whether it be attached to a friendship, my job, or even my spirituality.

Grace renders my big chart useless. It basically renders all my hard work useless. Because it’s not because of what I do, it’s because of who I am. And I am God’s child. I’m His kiddo. He’s going to take care of me no matter what. That’s not the hard part to grasp though. I think the harder part to grasp sometimes is that He’s going to take care of everyone no matter what. The drunks, the gays, the politically corrupt, the abusers, the addicts, and even those who have hated Him… He’s going to take care of them too. One day in Heaven, I may be sitting at the Lord’s table next to some drunk dude I met at a party that I didn’t care for because he was all over my friends. Or maybe by some famous murderer, covered with tattoos of hate, who was known for raping children and killing their families. Who knows?

Sometimes thinking about this rubs me the wrong way. It depends on my mood. Sometimes I like my big chart. I like to know I’m being a good kid and that I’m better than a lot of the kids that don’t even have checkmarks. But enter grace and out goes my chart. My big question then is, “Why even bother being good?!” If no one is really keeping track and I have already accepted Christ into my heart years ago, then can’t I just be another heathen and live how I want to?

Well, I guess my big answer that I already know is, yes. Yes I could. But then the second part to my answer is a question: Did I really accept Christ into my heart years ago, and if so, do I still love Him? My personal answers to these questions are yes and yes. Oh, there’s the kicker. I love Christ. As much as I hate to admit it sometimes, it’s true. I can live in the world and love all the shiny fun things it has to offer, but everytime those shiny things fade, I go back. I go back to my First Love. I hate to admit it because I definitely don’t live like I love Him. That’s when I want to bring the chart back to show everyone I do love Him, but those marks are for show. They are all in vain. Maybe a few of those were in His name, but for a good majority of it, it wasn’t.

Yes I can live anyway I want to. But I love Him. And when you love someone, you ravish them with gifts. These don’t have to be material things, understand. You can give them your time, your thoughts, your belongings. Things that are so important to you, giving them away would be a sacrifice. And the more you love someone, the more you tend to give, right? We won’t draw a chart up for that right now, but we’ll just say I’m working on it.

I’ve still got a long way to go before my heart and mind will grasp this concept of grace. But I imagine when I finally let it begin to really soak in, I will be truly free to love.