“…what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life burgeons! Look at it! All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and him…” (2 Cor 5:17-18)
Opening the book, she acquiesced and softened to the easy style of the author. What he wrote was clear. It made sense. He certainly offered a new perspective. Immediately, she fumed. She felt the impotence of her former churches. Why hadn’t she been spoken to like that: clear and relevant? In her experience, church was a ritualistic and hollow experience, something done to pacify the guilty conscious. It was a deed. But of course it was for her; it could be nothing else. The service could be beautiful, but not transformative. It didn’t hold the power to communicate to her heart.
However, something strange was happening during the reading. Instead of responding with skepticism, she started agreeing. What Graham was writing made sense in her heart. For the first time, she began to glimpse a God who loves, a God who is good, and incomparably perfect and holy. In comparison, she was filthy! She had never viewed herself like that before; she was good and always trying to improve. But in that moment, the floodgates of agony over her pride, self-sufficiency, fear, and anxiety overtook her! The desire to be right with God and to finally believe felt confounding. She was agreeing with God! The door to God’s amazing love opened and the tears of confession fell.
Adjusting in her seat, she felt awkward about the close proximity of the man sitting next to her. “What’s up with her?” She imagined him wondering. Standing up, she made the way back to the cramped, malodorous bathroom. At least she could be alone to process what was going on. Door locked. “Oh, God! What’s happening to me? I’ve been wrong. I had no idea. Forgive me…” She sobbed, letting it go, breaking off from the past.
After a while, the intensity subsided. She regained composure returning to her seat and the book. Devouring every word, she inhaled every concept Graham was writing. She didn’t want to miss a point. A raw hunger arose from within.
The plane landed. Walking through the airport, she grappled with the experience and her newfound feelings. She felt a freedom which lifted her a mile high. Were the darkness and anxiety gone? She had always carried those weights around; they weren’t there anymore. In their place serenity, purpose and love – unexplainable love – remained. Laughing aloud she wondered, “Was this for real? Did I just have a conversion experience? Is this love I now feel toward God?”
She saw differently too. It was as though she were looking through a clear lens; the scales that colored her world gray had fallen from her eyes. Now, the vibrancy of God’s truth colored everything she saw.
Residing in a peace about what lay ahead, she no longer wrestled with the inevitable end. She felt peace in spite of the outcome. That made no human sense! The sorrow remained, but it wasn’t tearing at her soul.
Is this change sustaining? “Oh God, let this be the new me, not a fleeting experience. This is too good. What I’ve missed out on!” She cried from her heart. She paused at the thought of returning home to her husband and children. How would they receive the “new” her? Would her husband scoff or understand this metamorphosis?
In spite of that, a passion was fanning into flames. She needed to know this God, this Jesus. She needed to read the Word, to grow, to pray, to seek after this God who set her free. A new direction marked her life: a life radically altered, set free from the power of sin, a life now lived out of gratitude and in harmony toward God – never to be bound again.
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