Being a child of grace.

Yesterday w as an incredible day, for the most part. Every day I can look around and see the blessings God has bestowed on me, and i can see his hand in my life. The new people He introduces me to, the old people He brings back into my life. The tiny blessings that I sometimes overlook, like cellphones and internet -or hand-written letters. Or quiet time alone with myself and God, in a warm, sunny place.

It's kind of common-knowledge, I guess, but I'm a little behind the learning curve. I have found that the more I trust God, and the more faith I have in Him, the happier I am. I find that pressing into Him, and making myself wholly dependent on Him is really freeing, actually. I feel like I'm really learning what it means to "become like a child" in my faith.

When I was younger, I thought that it meant to have an unquestioning, straight forward, doubt-free faith. Because children are not burdened with the weight and doubt of the world. There is that, to a degree, but there is more.

Matthew 18:3-4 says, "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become more like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefor, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

Children are innocent. But I don't think that's what God is saying when He asks us to become like children. He is saying, "become dependent on me. Let me carry your sorrows and your hurt and your fear. I will take it from you, and make you free." He is asking us to lean on Him in every way. Children are inept -at pretty much everything. They cannot do anything that really matters on their own. And, often times, when they do, they screw it up, big time.

We are like children still, only we need to really see that. Imagine a parent with a five-year old. That child is still almost completely dependent on his mother and father. But the child is always trying to do things on his own. Crossing the street, making breakfast, doing the dishes. Often times, the child gets hurt trying to do these things on his own.

We are the same way. We demonstrate the first half of our childlike nature by focusing too much on growing up and "standing on our own two feet" by saying "okay God, I'll take it from here." And still, God waits patiently for us to return again and again, until we finally realize that we can't do it alone.

"Children are our model," Brennan Manning says, "because they have no claim on heaven. If they are close to God, it is because they are incompetent, not because they are innocent. If they receive anything, it can only be as a gift."

What we need to be, is like children. The second half of our childlike nature, is wholly dependent on our own divine parent. We cannot do it without Him. He wants to care for us, and nurture us. He wants to feed our hungry spirits help them grow and flourish into His own children. Children who come to Him with everything.

I am trying, very hard, not to screw that up, this time. In other words, whenever I want to go "fix things", I am sitting tight and unmoving, and praying my little human heart out. I feel so much freer, because of this. I love Him with all my heart. And I need Him. My hope is that I will, with His help, be able to overcome whatever is thrown my way. Because I know now that I cannot do it alone. And I am so tired of ignoring His lessons, just to satisfy my human desire to do it myself.

Albert Einstein said that insanity is "doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result." That is exactly what I have been doing, forever. Especially after Luke and I split up, eight months ago. I have a conversation with God, and, follow a similar protocol to Michelle's blog entry that I just linked. And I do this, over and over and over again, and, for some reason, I expect that maybe this time I will be able to "fix things" on my own. So I am really having to stop, sit down, shut up, and hand it over to my heavenly Father. Having to depend on Him to fix my life, and iron out the wrinkles that I, inevitably, put in the fabric of my life. To kiss my bruises and bandage my cuts and make it all better. I am having to become like a child.

I want to accept God's grace. Manning says, "acceptance means simply to turn to God."

"I mean simply that a living, loving God can and does make His presence felt, can and does speak to us in the silence of our hearts, can and does warm and caress us till we no longer doubt that He is near, that He is here."

If trusting God means giving my heart over to Him, and putting my life in His hands; then I think it is so very worth it, for the result of a relationship with endless, unconditional love and a God who will never leave, never let you down, and never make you walk alone.