As we both know, I have a great deal of experience living with loss and guilt. We also know I have made some very bad decisions and I am not qualified to offer advice on most topics, especially these types of issues. However, with all my heart and soul, I KNOW and can testify to all who will hear, you are a good person. You harbor not one evil attribute nor conceal ill motives for any step or stumble you have taken.

Although you may look at your life and reflect upon the pain and occasional misstep or apparent misfortune, you will come to appreciate these apparitions as mere side effects of limited perspective. Again, I tell you this not because I am wiser, but simply because I have been on this journey longer. The longer we live and the further we move along the path, the more we come to understand that we really know very little.

It’s an old cliché, but to “miss the forest for the trees” is perhaps one of life’s most important proverbs. So many times we feel pressured, or pressure ourselves, to “fix” our problems or battle with our shortcomings in the never ending quest for perfection, or at the least, societal acceptance or approval, that perhaps we miss the greater reward.

Maybe we aren’t supposed to be perfect. Maybe we aren’t even supposed to try to be.

God designed each of us for a particular purpose. In general, I believe He created “man” (as in humankind, not just the male form) for companionship. He wanted to SHARE (life or whatever you wish to name this experience or journey) with someone of His likeness and design. Certainly we were designed to be perfect, but obviously if that was what was most important to God, we would have never been given the ability to fall short of His Glory.

Instead, God’s desire was for us to choose our own path, even if our choice was leading us in the worst direction, for perhaps His greatest intend or expectation was that we SHARE our journey with Him and not attempt to become Him. Of course God doesn’t want any of us to die or go to hell or fall away from His presence, but I believe He has never left our side no matter how deep into hell we may have fallen.

God cries for us to repent and to be free from sin, but if His highest priority was to design such a perfect creature, He may have well just made a few more angels.

Wow…So why all this stuff about the “meaning of life”?

Here is my point. If God designed us to share with Him our thoughts, feelings and experiences, repenting of our sins and asking for His Grace and guidance to show us the better way, maybe we are hardwired or programmed to see the forest because we acknowledge and perhaps, appreciate each tree.

Still sound like I’m a whacked-out lumberjack?

Try this analogy. We commit a sin or do something we know is against the Will of God. He tells us that we need only to confess through Jesus Christ, ask for His forgiveness and we are made pure in His sight. Did He tell us we must make any reparations for the sin? No. Nor did he say we would ever need to “pay” for any part of that sin for any period of time from now until the end of time (if there was such a time). Do you see that a sin is not a sentence or a debt beyond the Grace of God and the Cross? God hates sin, but not because it is something so big and powerful that it is difficult to overcome. I mean, all we have to do is go to Him and repent (just use our heart’s voice) and the sin is dead and forgotten forever. That doesn’t seem like a very “powerful” force to be overcome.

Instead, God hates sin because it puts separation between us. It keeps us from SHARING everything with Him. It’s as if we use sin as a little dark room we enter and close Him out. That’s why He hates it so much. Jesus came to bridge the distance we put between ourselves and God. Not to make us pay for our sins. He paid for the sins of the entire world and proved to us how powerless sin was to God.

So where does this lead us? If we are purposed and programmed to share and our sins are forgiven, then what keeps us from fulfilling Gods plan for our life and bringing us ultimate peace and joy? Emotional Isolation.

We isolate ourselves from God and emotionally from each other because we let our “problems” or memories of our faults compel us to believe if anyone found out about our “sin” we would lose our place in line. Or worse yet, we may be pushed away from the line completely.

Fear. Pride. Sadness. Loneliness. Anxiety. Anger. Rage. The list goes on and on, but they are not caused by the “power” of sin. They result from emotional isolation. We were not created to hide our issues, problems or pain. We were designed to share with God, and each other, every aspect of our lives. Both the physical and emotional. The good AND especially the bad.

We are only complete and content when we make a connection to others via a shared expression of our common experience/journey. When we share our thoughts/feelings/experiences with others and they confess (share) they have experienced the same, a connection is made and the one missing piece of our design/creation is put into place. At those moments, and only those moments, are we content, at peace and our perspectives of life are divinely accurate.

So while you may feel burdened by the past, or powerless to make restitution, remember that God created us to share our experiences (life) and the only way to share is to look at each tree. Touch it. Smell it. Learn to respect its place in the garden, but most of all, acknowledge it exists. Then share your experience with God and others in your life,

“Yes. I have done things in my life for which I am not happy or proud. But I’m human. Thank God for His grace to forgive me for those mistakes, but also for giving me the opportunity to share with you how I felt back then and what I did to help me feel better about my life, now.”

and you may someday see the beauty and wonders of the entire forest.

I miss you and will remember you and keep you in my prayers, always.

Love,
B