From the Executive Director’s Heart

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Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? Fair questions we will all ask in our lifetime. For Christ-followers, our journey toward objective reality and wholeness (Truth) must begin and end at the foot of His cross. As children of the Living God, we have embarked on an adventure where we encounter both joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, hope and disappointment; sometimes simultaneously. This transforming, refining process often referred to as sanctification, does not occur without some challenges along the way. At times those challenges can consist of our inability to love others aright, thus effecting our love toward God and ourselves. Sometimes in our attempt to love others well, we’ve neglected to see how we’ve wounded (or been wounded) and deceived by love that fails. We must admit in order to love we need to be loved by an unfailing Source- only Jesus’ love can meet the deepest cries of our heart! In fact, our perceptions of reality can be distorted due to past, unresolved hurts and wounds. OUCH!!! Though there is joy in the journey, there is also purpose in the pain. So then, why do we more often than not do everything possible to avoid, deny or suppress our pain? But you may be saying, why would anyone in their right mind remain in pain? [Someone once described insanity as doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result. Hello! Anyone still there? ]

Andy Comiskey states “out of our broken souls we have sought wholeness in false ways.” Isn’t it amazing how we will remain in the pain of the familiar, false self (the self that is alienated from Christ) while being fully aware of The Redeemer of our souls, who alone can resurrect the true self (the self that emerges in union with Christ!) Jesus reclaims our true self as we die to old patterns of lies, misperceptions and distortions about ourselves. Dying to self does not mean neglecting self; Jesus calls us to put to death only the false self and its ways. Leanne Payne writes in Restoring The Christian Soul: “We must differentiate between the self that collaborates with the principle of evil and selfishness, and the self that abides in Christ and collaborates with Him. That is the true self. That is the justified new creation, the soul that is saved and lives eternally. The former self we deliberately and continually die to; the other we joyfully and in great humility and thankfulness accept.” C.S. Lewis in “Mere Christianity” adds: “Your [true] real, new self (which is Christ’s and also yours, and yours just because it is His) will not come as long as you are looking for it. It will come when you are looking for Him.” This reality brings tears of joy to my eyes. In part because of the great sacrifice my Lord has endured on the Cross for my sins and also because of His persistent, unconditional love that graciously and painfully transforms me into His image… These are the very issues our Living Waters© and CROSSCURRENT™ group participants currently grapple with. However, as we (and you) practice His presence “at the foot of the cross, we allow Jesus to reveal the false reference points under which we have labored.” <><

“For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for Him who died for them and was raised again.” II Corinthians 5:14-15

@ In the next issue we will further investigate ways in which we have lived out the false self rather than the true.

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