Inside Out by Dr. Larry Crabb

The last few days have consisted of God sending a message to me loud and clear: “Gary, the fire I'm bringing you through is painful. Its meant to be painful, because in reality, it's the pain that draws you off of yourself and on to me. You can't change under your own power. No formula or prescribed obedience to a set of rules is going to draw you to complete dependence on me. The problem of your sin and pain, and of living in an imperfect world is what draws you to me.”

This is the message of the book I'm reading by Larry Crabb titled, Inside Out. Growing up in the Christian church, I was taught all kinds of formulas for “victorious” Christian living. If I just do this or that, I'll grow closer to God and my problems will disappear. In my chosen and felt addictions, the message was essentially the same as I tried to correlate what I was hearing to what I was feeling. “Grow closer to God and those unspeakable feelings and obsessions will disappear.” “Read the Bible and pray more often and the disappointments of life will slowly fade.”

As Larry Crabb states in this introduction chapter, “The point of living the Christian life has shifted from knowing and serving Christ till he returns to soothing, or at least learning to ignore, the ache in our soul.”

Is this “soothing” or “ignoring” really what God has intended for his chosen? Did God say that the heaven we all yearn for can be achieved in this world? I think God is clear in stating an emphatic “no” to these questions. Can we have our appetites whetted for what is about to come? I believe God's answer to this is “yes.” Through God's spirit, we can attain a glimpse or “foretaste” of what is yet to come for us in heaven. But not in a way we ever expected. We want immediate relief! We don't want to suffer! Yes, as hard as it is to accept, it's the suffering and imperfections of life that draw us to the only true cure for our ills: Jesus Christ. And by “cure” we don't mean someone who will just take away the pains and heartaches of this world for us. By “cure” we mean a God who chose to come to earth and shoulder ALL “pains” for us on a cross. The cross was our avenue back to God. It restored our relationship to God in an imperfect world. We still live in an imperfect world, but have a perfect Savior who rescues us from eternal separation from God in the end. If this event had not occurred, it would be “eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” But God has heaven in store for us who believe and trust in him now. Not heaven now, but later on in this story of life.

This is the hope I must cling to with all my heart. In the midst of those times when I feel angry, depressed, fearful, unbelieving and rebellious, God has promised something better. I look forward to that day! In the meantime, God has not chosen to remove all the thorns. And in most cases, it's these thorns that keep me dependant on him. Our sinful human nature is independent. We want to believe we can do it on our own! “Be more disciplined; study harder; immerse yourself in studies or work; just say 'no.'” But the reality is that we need God. We even need God to truly love and trust other people! Because all of us our imperfect beings, our identity must be centered on God. God wants us to be involved in helping each other. In our imperfections though, we ultimately end up hurting others and getting hurt ourselves. So we shrink away and don't fully open up to others. We've been burned in the past, and we're not going to let that happen again! But if our identity and dependence is on God, we can move forward and love others in courage because 1) we know we are far from perfect ourselves, 2) we know that nothing will separate us from the love of God. In the midst of rejection, failures, hurts, and imperfections in this world we can love because we know we are loved by God.

So my prayer in my own journey is this: That I will never seek the quick fix that doesn't exist. That I will grapple with my own imperfections and choose to reach out in love and grace to others because that is the way my Lord reaches out to me in the midst of my own junk. It is only in brokenness we can truly love others. We are all broken people who need God. As this Christmas season approaches, may we all forget about all the commercialism and illusions that try to paint this world as a “heaven now” existence. That is a lie, and I think this is why many people have a distaste for modern Christmas. May we instead focus on the beautiful Savior who was born to save us from ourselves; so we could live for him in the middle of a less-than-perfect world, truly impacting others who are going through the same pain and suffering. May it be so.