and for this i am grateful

i realized tonight, through a conversation with a person i care for very much, that God has been chasing me. perhaps this seems like a silly revelation being that i have been a "christian" for about as long as i can remember. whether it started when i was five and felt convicted about some silly childhood fib, that my parents would never have found out about, but i still thought i'd die if i didn't tell "someone" i was sorry. or at ten, thirteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, when i was baptized (yes more than once) or "re-commited " my life to God for the umpteenth time. or if it was when i had my heart broken for the first time. i am not entirely sure when that was. because it has broken in small places throughout my entire life. but of course there were the big ones. my father's affair. telling my mother about my father's affair. the boy for the first time. the same boy. for a second time. or the deaths of people i loved. or perhaps there was no beginning. maybe i have subconsciously always know that, although i was born "into sin," God had long ago bought me at a price and was just waiting for me to figure it out. because people have been telling me for some time now that "God is after you." "God loves you more than anything." "you are made in His image." "He just wants to spend time with you. He wants you to talk to Him. to give Him all your worries." sometimes they even yelled it. i heard their voices. sometimes i even took them to heart. my eyes burned with tears while someone played acoustic guitar in the background. you know the classic church soundtrack to the movie version of your life. and your salvation. at some point within the last year. it got real. or maybe i got real. i know God has always been real. maybe even some of what they were saying was real. so i guess that leaves us with the last option. i got real. my life got really real. things were bit too much for me. i was living this terribly legalistic lifestyle on the outside. but i was so miserable on the inside. to be completely honest. i wasn't living it either. i would bible thump for a couple months. beat myself up. go party. feel bad, but keep partying. go to church. lie. not go to church. beat myself up some more. tell myself that if i couldn't get it together God would never want me. and if i was doomed to keep messing up then what was the point in trying. stop! do you see what i see? it was all about ME. it isn't about me. i couldn't have dreamt me up if i was tripping on the best acid known to man. (i've never actually done acid, but i was thinking about how creative the Beatles were and i hear they did a lot of it.) only He made me. only He made all of us. this whole thing was His idea. so when i make it about me, i take the focus away from Him. the only one who knows me. the only one who knew every stupid, ugly, good, and loving thing i have ever done or will ever do. i never got what the word grace meant, until i was shown it by people who were truly after His heart. until i was loved in a way that was always gracious. always forgiving. even before i said "i'm sorry." what is the sense in apologizing to someone who has already forgiven you? what is the point in fixing yourself when He sees nothing wrong with you to begin with? when i tell myself that i'm not good enough to go to Him with everything and for anything i am blatantly denying the gift Christ gave me in His death, burial, and resurrection. i am looking into Jesus' big, brown, endless, sparkling eyes and saying "no, thanks dude. i can do this on my own. you don't want me anyway. i'm a mess." can you imagine how that makes Him feel? "alright, caitlin. i was beaten and bruised. mocked, shamed, spit on, and killed. i saw your face. i was cleaned with my mother's tears. buried. and ROSE FROM THE DEAD. and i saw your face. i was the spotless sacrifice my Father sent to rid you of the excuses you're offering me now. and i saw your face. i want you. just the way you are. right now. trust me." how can i do that? i can't. i won't anymore. as i allow myself to be stripped of all the bull, i am continually running in to layers of my past self that are very painful. some of them are so ugly it takes me days to admit to just myself that they were revealed at all. but when i give them to Him, when i begin to believe what He says about me, that i am beautiful, beloved, sought after, loved, and a co-heir in His kingdom. the ugliness is dissolved. eradicated. bound and sent to the foot of the cross to be dealt with accordingly. now don't think that just because He wants you exactly the way you are, wherever you are, that He won't change you. because He will. when you encounter the living God you can't help but be changed. i am constantly being redefined. whether it is as simple has hardly being able to stomach television (which is just my thing) or wanting to talk through, walk through, and fight for love in every corner of my life no matter what the cost is to me, it happens. dying to self. i've heard that saying somewhere before. haha. but to feel it happen. to take your pride by the throat, kicking and screaming, and hand it over to Jesus...wow. i must have been a very angry girl for a very long time. this is the most free i have ever felt. and this is just the beginning.