Sometimes.

Sometimes I wonder if I do the right thing for the wrong reasons.

Sometimes I wonder if the right thing isn’t so right.

What if all the people doing the wrong things are actually doing the right thing?

If I do the wrong thing, will I feel right?

This is the sound of my head exploding. It happens a lot.

Penance.

I grew up going to Catholic church and there was this seemingly strange set of actions we would do on occasions - we would go to a small room, lay out all our wrongdoings to the mystery man behind the screen, then go back to the sanctuary and then go through our penance. I came to know this routine fairly well (as our church was full of routines) and no matter what I would say, I knew my penance would be the same: five “Our Fathers” aka “The Lord’s Prayer.”

This process never jived with me because I was still ridden with guilt and shame, but on the surface level, I liked it. I liked that I could screw up big time, just confess it to the mystery man (who was usually our priest, duh, we only had one), say a prayer five times and be clean again.

But now I know different. I know it’s not about what I do or could ever do. Now when I screw up, I have to rely on faith and grace to cover that up. It jives with me more than my legalistic upbringing, but every day I forget. I forget that when I screw up, there’s nothing I can do to ultimately rectify what I did. I could apologize and perform acts of kindness ’til I’m blue in the face, but what I screwed up happened and there’s no going back.

This is where I have to let go. I have to realize there is no penance and that God’s grace covers all my muckups, even the ones I refuse to forgive myself for. It’s almost like I want to hold on to my darkness until there’s something I can do about it. But I can’t. There’s been no human being that was able to fix all of their problems (which really renders self-help books and American psychology useless) so why do I insist I can do this?

I don’t think Jesus died on the cross so I could be held prisoner by my own guilt and shame.

As Martin Luther said (as retold by Derek Webb in explaining his song, “Nobody Loves Me“):

Luther was once asked at his church why, week after week, all he preached was the Gospel. Luther’s reponse was, “Well, because week after week you forget it. Until you walk in here looking like people who are truly liberated by the truth of the Gospel, I’m going to keep on preaching it to you.”

The Truth.

I usually don’t post lyrics unless they are mine, but this one answers a lot of the questions that have been looming on my mind… my responsibilities as a follower of Christ as it pertains to influencing others in their relationship with the Lord. Or lack of. I am flawed, so “for the sake of the world I thank the Lord that the truth’s not contingent on me.”

“The Truth” - Caedmon’s Call/Derek Webb

I’ve been putting on and putting off too many people
And I’m getting old to live like an injured man
Ailment and unfilled prescription like the nose on my face
Like a broken boat safety raft and a love for the water
And I just can’t decide to sink or swim it’s me or them
Should I save myself or go back for the others because

Maybe there’s no gray and I was wrong to tell ‘em so
And maybe all that I’ve to do was done a long time ago

‘Cause there was life before my life
There was provision before my need
There was redemption before my sin
For the sake of the world I thank the Lord
That the truth’s not contingent on me

I’ve been dressing up and dressing down for too many people
And I’m a little young to live like a troubled boy, a troubled soul
A fish out of water, ’cause we’re all just the same
We’re all just as good and just as bad and just as distracted
By the corners of our eyes as our fathers were and theirs before
And all those before them and still I glance around

And with the way I stare you’d think I’d seen through a two-by-four
And with the way I walk you’d think I’d never seen grace before

But I’ve been putting up and putting down too many things
That I know nothing about but I’m jealous of
Holding pride as tight as I can like she was my only daughter