The Harder I Try

In church yesterday, we sang "Wholly Yours" by David Crowder, and I had one of those moments where you have sung something time and time again, but at one point in the song certain lyrics just hit you and they mean more to you, for whatever reason. Here's a simple concept that hit me like a brick in the face:

"But the harder I try/The more clearly can I/Feel the depth of our fall/And the weight of it all/And so this might could be/The most impossible thing/Your grandness in me/Making me clean/Glory, glory, hallelujah."

I realized: I try too hard.

I don't know if I ever fully grasped the concept of living life on my own. I would argue that, for the most part, I can be a fairly independently minded person when it comes to many things, but actually trying to get through each day by myself--to juggle classes, being an RA, preparing for my first fieldwork experience, being involved in campus activities, campus ministries, and interacting with friends. Trying to do all of that independently can get tricky after a while. Let me tell you.

On a deeper level, I've been trying so hard to handle myself. To try to put myself back together. To exact justice in my life where I think it's needed. To organize everything so that I can maybe manage to sleep. To try to do things right. To try to please everyone. To 'function properly.'

I think in the back of my mind I figured this out a long time ago. But in the more recent past, I have seriously tried to be in the driver's seat of my own life, and have painfully figured out that's not my place.

The harder I try, the more clearly I feel the weight and the depth of my sin. Of my dirtiness. Of my rottenness.

BUT. The most beautiful word in the Bible. Actually, Randy Pope says it's 'but God,' so really the Bible's most beautiful word needs to be coupled with the other most beautiful word 'God' to achieve fully that effect. Anywho. :)

If you don't know me, you may not know that I always ask the question "why." I'm curious about why people do things, think things, say things. I want to know about the meaning behind it. I'm one of those annoying over-analyzers. This kind of thinking leads me to believe someone must have a motive to love me. To accept me. There has to be a reason, a purpose, a justification for this action.

BUT this, God's love, God's grace, GOD, might could be the most impossible thing: HIS grandness IN me? It makes me CLEAN? It makes me WHOLE?

It is quite possibly the most impossible thing because God doesn't have to have a reason to love me. To shower His grace over me. To clean me up. Not to give up on me every day I decide I want to try to live my life without Him. I have done nothing to earn any of it. I have not given Him a reason to love me. Yet He still does. And I have to learn to be loved without asking "why." It's a hard thing for me. In general.

It really does seem impossible. BUT. Glory, Hallelujah.