Worth it all.
I want to start off with this reminder:
You are loved by God.
Or as we say in the Netherlands,
“God houdt van je” (God loves you).
I know it’s a common phrase that gets tossed around often, especially in the modern Christian world, but sometimes those words lose their weight, and I just wanted to remind you, that you are loved by the God who created all the heavens and earth.
God has a purpose for you and He wants so simply for you to know that you will forever and always be loved, seen, cherished, and valued by Him.
The reality of this statement has really been wrecking me over the course of this DTS, not only how much He loves me and what that means in my own life, but that He has that same love for every single person on this planet, and He longs to see every person know that they are loved by Him, and He longs for that love to set every single person free from whatever it is that is stealing life, joy, or freedom from them. Whether it be anxiety, depression, fear of what others think of you, pain from trauma, or any other thing that isn’t life in abundance, God wants to see every person on this earth, walking in freedom from that.
Recently, we had our Dutch outreach in Utrecht, a city about 30 minutes away by train. We spent the week sleeping on the dining room floor in a church there (real girl scouts/boy scouts vibes, I absolutely loved it) we worshipped, prayed around the city with the city council, met amazing people in Utrecht, did a food bank, and handed out free bibles in 70 different languages! (That was so incredible to do and SUCH a gift!)
We had lectures that week on location with an incredible teacher and one of our base leaders named Tron Ansaldo (this man and his wife are absolute legends, the definition of tough skin and tender hearts; so hospitable, so wise, and just so radically obedient and in love with Jesus). In this week of lectures Tron taught us about Paul, you know, that one guy who wrote 13 books of the New Testament…so basically most of the New Testament? Yeah, that wild guy.
It was incredible to hear the background of Paul’s life, the time He would have grown up in, and what it really meant for Paul to not only become a Christian after persecuting them, but to then become one of the main pioneers of the faith after who he used to be.
To sum up in one word, Paul’s entire life and everything he wrote about, was grace.
Undeserved grace.
Unearned grace.
Grace that no person should ever have received, especially coming from the past that Paul came from.
Paul deserved death.
I’m sure there are a few people in history that we could think of who legitimately, deserve to rot in hell and suffer for all of eternity; Paul was one of those people. And the creator of the universe, the only one worthy of judging anyone as guilty or not guilty, calls this man, “my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and the people of Israel.” Acts 9:15.
If I’m being honest, I had always looked at this story so surface level, like, “wow, yeah, with Jesus all sin is forgiven and we can turn from our ways and walk into new life. (true) Chill, cool, yeah, redemption is possible, dope.” It’s just been something I’ve read and heard and it’s inspiring for sure, but I had never fully realized the weight of it until this week. Because this week, I actually thought about this, contemplated the depth of it for the first time, and began to understand what it truly meant.
We talked more historically of what it really looked like for Paul (Saul) to be persecuting people…
It was brutal.
Horrendous.
This man and his army would go into people’s homes, and if they believed in Jesus, he would drag them out, imprison them, torture them, or kill them. Men. Women. Children. It didn’t matter who you were, if you believed in Jesus or he even thought you did, that was enough for him.
This man was brutal and relentless. And Jesus not only forgave him, but he also gave him a new name, a new purpose, a completely new identity. He washed everything that He used to be away, and turned his life around in a moment. And Paul went from being the person who lived his life to stop the gospel from spreading to being the person livinghislife to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ.
That’s insane.
I’m still blown away by that.
I’m gonna be honest, I am more and more confronted the more I get to know the perfection and beauty of Jesus, with just how broken my humanity is.
I can say for sure, that, had I been alive back then, I never would have trusted Paul or wanted to forgive him. I would never believe that someone could turn from such terrible ways. I probably would have been standing on the sidelines cheering on his death. I’m sorry if that’s uncomfortable, it’s just true. He was a terrible terrible person who did terrible things. He did not deserve forgiveness, and yet… Jesus forgave him. His life was forever changed by the freely given gift of grace. Because that’s who God is. That’s Jesus.
And this challenged me so much! It’s still challenging me!
Because, well, I always thought I was a really gracious and forgiving person. But I always grew up with the phrase, “forgive but don’t forget,” or “fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me,” and for me, well, forgiving someone looked like, “yeah, I forgive you,” but in my mind I wouldn’t forget what they did, and I would put up walls to protect myself, because if they fooled me twice, nope not going to let that happen again. So I’d get judgmental and critical as a means of self-protection. “Oh no, me? Psh, I’m a really gracious and forgiving person, I don’t hold grudges,” but this week, hearing the story of Paul, and how Jesus forgave him and believed the best in him, I was so confronted. Confronted with, if I claim to believe in Jesus, claim that I am a follower of Jesus, and that I’m on a journey to becoming more like him, then, this principle of freely given grace and forgiveness, is something that I need to fully believe in too.
It’s so contrary to how our society thinks today. And I felt so much shame when I realized this about myself. Gosh, it was so confronting! So convicting!
But, to bring it full circle, this last week our speaker was an AMAZING and powerful woman named Pat Caven from the US (whoop whoop), a New Yorker (with the accent hehe) who was part of the hippy movement in the 60s/70s and was radically saved by Jesus, spent a decent time living here in Amsterdam with YWAM in the 90s, and she taught a lot on *drumroll please*…
SHAME!
Oof. Such a heavy topic but so so good! Her catchphrase was this cute little, “shame is not my name,” kind of along to the tune of, “talk to the hand ‘cause the face ain’t listenin’” if you ever heard that!
And she spoke a lot on forgiveness and grace as well, and really what it means when we give our lives to Christ and make the decision to follow Jesus, how our past no longer defines who we are. Not that it goes away, but that it no longer has power over us or who we are. She brought so much authenticity and honesty into her teaching (classic New Yorker, loved that), and she spoke so honestly just about being human!
Because, we are human!
We have a nature to us that isn’t inherently that great, pretty sucky actually. We get mad, we get mean, we judge, we criticize, we all have our bad sides, that’s the reality of living in this world but there’s no shame in that because *another drumroll please*…
We are FREE!
By the grace and forgiveness of God that has been given so freely by Jesus’ suffering on the cross and resurrection, we are now free!
“Therefore, there is now, no condemnation (no guilty verdict, no punishment) for those who are in Christ Jesus (who believe in Him as personal Lord and Savior). For the law of the Spirit of life (which is) in Christ Jesus (the law of our new being) has set you free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:1-2 (AMP)
There is no more shame when you are a child of God!!!!!
Learning of Saul’s conversion to Paul, about the gift of God’s undeserved grace, and then feeling so confronted with my own past and shame, then having this week’s teaching from Pat on the freedom found in Jesus Christ, and how “shame is not any of our names!” (ha, so cute, I can’t get over that!) really shifted so much of my thinking and well, I felt so FREE!
That’s the only word I can use to describe it! I realized that I had lived so much of my life in shame without ever knowing it, so much of how I operated was from a place of shame. I felt I needed to work for God’s grace, to earn His love, that I had this massive debt on my life that I have to work tirelessly to pay off and constantly feeling that it was impossible to do and I would never ever be able to do enough and duh! I can’t! None of us can! That’s why we need Jesus! That’s why we need grace! Because in our own strength, we will never be able to pay off the wages of sin and death!
But Jesus is so beautiful that He never says, “Wow, I cannot believe you can’t be perfect, psh, so disappointing,” noooooo, He never says that!
Jesus is so sweetly like, “Yeah, I know you can’t, that’s okay, I’ll pay it for you.”
The most generous, “I got you,” in all of history and all eternity!
That’s the grace of God!
The greatest act of generosity this world will ever see.
I’m struck more than ever before with the beauty of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior; our King!
The grace of God cannot be earned, it can’t be gained, it can never be deserved. We will never reach a point in our lives where we will ever be able to say, “yeah, I deserve the grace of God.” Even the most amazing person on this planet today, the kindest, most gentle and amazing person you know, doesn’t deserve it. But along with that, nothing you have ever thought or done, is too big for Jesus. There is nothing too big for Jesus to forgive. There is no amount of shame too big for Him. Nothing you have ever done is bigger than the power of the blood of Jesus Christ.
His blood covers all sin.
There is no condemnation in Him.
Only freedom.
Only love.
That’s just who He is.
These weeks have opened my eyes to just how much an encounter with Jesus can change someone’s life, it’s changed mine, and it still does more and more every day. I have this new eagerness to spread the gospel for the freedom that comes with it, like Paul did. Because everyone is worthy of knowing that they are forgiven and loved by the Almighty God, everyone.
And it’s when we are free and know that we are fully loved by Him, that we then can pour that love out to others, without expecting anything in return. I can’t wait to see how this will affect the way I live and love those in my life, and I hope that maybe this moves you too, into greater freedom knowing that you are so stinking loved by Jesus!
Blessings and so much love,
Savannah <3