"How are you?"
"I'm good. How was your weekend?"
"My weekend was good." And its going pleasantly scripted when instead of saying, "I would like a BLT with potato chips and coffee in a green mug" he says, "Your weekend was good? How so?"
And now I have to think.
Shoot.
I thoughtlessly stated that my weekend was good without thinking for one second about whether my weekend actually was good. I can't even remember having a weekend. Since waking up at 4:00 AM I could barely remember what day it was or what universe I lived in.
We're so good at replying with the right thing. I guarantee if I go up to the woman at the counter in this coffee shop right now and ask her how she is doing, she will say that she is good. Is she actually good? I don't know. My Dad likes to say, "Don't try to come up with the right answer. Tell me the honest answer."
Jesus: "Simon son of John, do you truly love me more then these?"
Simon: "Yes, Lord. You know that I love you."
Jesus: "Simon son of John, do you truly love me?"
Simon: "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you."
Jesus: "Simon son of John, do you love me?"
Simon: "Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you."
(John 21:15-17)
I don't think Jesus wanted the right answer. He wanted the honest answer.
Midway through a conversation with a friend, they asked, "I don't know how to word this...But, how are you doing?" I wouldn't have actually paused to think about the question if it was flippantly tagged to the beginning of the conversation. But he thought about the question. Then asked it. So I thought about the question. Then answered it. There's a contagious pattern to honesty. I'm the master of half-truths. I love to exaggerate the truth to make a bigger laugh, a bigger gasp; I like to shape larger then life cartoons out seemingly insignificant situations. I'm also the master of watering down serious situations, either out of laziness or fear of what others will think.
I opened up a gritty part of my heart to someone, and they asked me a simple question. One that I've heard a million times before.
"Do you know that God loves you?"
"Yup."
"Because he does."
I nod.
"He loves you."
"Okay."
"God loves you."
I'm crying now. Why am I crying? I know God loves me. Because he loves everyone. But he's got a lot of kids. And just one that messes up quite a bit. A mistake maker.
So maybe I have the knowledge that God loves me. But do I believe it? Could I have been apart of Gods family for five years and not believe God loves me? That when he said "I forgive you" that it wasn't just an automatic "right" response? Because I know I've said I forgive people who in my heart I haven't forgiven.Jesus wasn't abused and hung by nails on two slabs of wood and slaughtered and brought back to life, scars and all, just to tell the world, "I mostly forgive you." That was him saying, "I love you. I'm not kidding."
And five years after adoption. I stopped knowing God loved me. I believed it.
It's one thing for a good man to die for his friend, it's a completely different thing for a perfect man to die for his enemy that he might live.
-Christopher Yuan
Honesty sucks. Full honesty, that is. Not half truths. It's this vulnerable, beautiful, fascinating, painful thing like surgery. But a doctor doesn't cut you open because he wants you dead. He cuts you open to heal you. In the words of Sarah Sparks:
Every day I'm learning how to die.
In every way I'm crushed on every side.
It's God the surgeon
And he's come to save my life.
I'm finding mercy cuts like a sharpened knife.
I've been aching,
So personal is pain.
If I'm not mistaken,
You like to give and take.
I'm afflicted,
But still you give me joy.
These bones you're breaking,
These bones they will rejoice.
