I’m sitting here as I do every morning, musing about life as the early sun dances in my back camper window. I’ve had my cappuccino and it’s given me the energy to think harder about grace and safety, judgements and superficiality, and how all of these are interrelated.
It seems to me that grace has a lot to do with how safe people feel to be honest. Not the superficial grace that just says the nicest thing in order to be liked but the depth of grace that knows the reality of the brokenness and genuinely sees past it into a human heart groping for healing. A grace big enough that even the most hardened and cynical soul can stand in its embrace and start to thaw a little.
We all know what it feels like to try to venture out a bit with a vulnerable piece of our experience and then to dash back quickly into silence as the little information we leaked is dissected and judged to the listener’s liking. Some individuals developed their faith in environments of harshness where motives were fried with the steak and actions chopped with the onions. I often speak to women who are living under the finger of an angry Father or controlling Mother.
When the human soul is conditioned on such brittle ground, softness becomes fearful and in order to emotionally survive we judge ourselves and others with a vengeance. Perfection becomes the only place of safety, and since perfection is impossible we are chronically in a state of urgency trying to perform better, do better, and work harder. Life becomes one exhausting struggle to please both ourselves and others. We dare not leak the negative emotions but they stream profusely in angry judgements because we can’t fake wholeness perfectly.
We cannot extend a radical grace we have not received, so we often keep casting judgements that are not ours to give.
This is why legalism is so deadly, its effect is judgements placed on others that are not ours to give and most often not a judgement God has placed on them. Those who are steeped in Pharisaical pride do not understand the grace of the Father and cannot receive it because God “opposes the proud, and gives grace to the humble.” Environments of legalism become unsafe for the broken and suffering because the extra requirements to become a part of the community are too heavy for many of them to bear. They also foster a superficial faith that cannot go too deep into the reality of pain, because it is unsafe to do so.
These are the places where survivors of sexual abuse get labeled “needy” and where a Pastor struggling through the process of grief gets dissected like a frog in biology class. The places where “fine, thanks” is the accepted response rain or shine, and the whitewashed exterior hides an interior life of chaos and pain.
Legalistic spaces might know a lot about the right way to do things because they see God as perpetually peering down with one eyebrow raised, waiting for us to make one wrong move. They see it as an act of charity to teach the rest of the world about righteousness and sin, carefully analysing others decisions to make sure they do the right thing.
The problem is always doing the right thing does not mean you’re living in right relationship. If my little son was constantly performing under a heavy load of expectations from others I would feel grief in my heart, even if he was teaching others how to do the right thing. I want my son to stop, look into my face, and see my smile of approval on his life. At the age of 1 1/2 he feels perfectly safe to loudly alert me of a disaster he created. He knows I am safe. He knows my face towards him is grace.
Our Father God is no different.
“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.”
Leviticus 26:13
Some of you have had a yoke placed on your from your youth that is unbearable. You’re like the Israelites who think living under the judgements they know is easer then moving into a freedom that feels new and frightening. Bowing under the yoke of other’s judgements feels easier than “walking erect” in the freedom of grace. It takes awareness to know what is yoking us to oppression and it’s often easier just to pull harder and learn to work more efficiently under the yoke of other’s judgements than to break free and take on His yoke for us. “Easy and light” doesn’t feel safe to a soul who has been conditioned to perform with perfection so we continue with head bowed, back bent, casting the same yoke on all who walk beside us.
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:28-30
The only reason we can feel completely safe with the Father is that He is “gentle and lowly” in heart. He is completely full of grace towards us. His eyes are burning with compassion. Grace is unmerited favour, a kindness we did not earn or deserve and yet He freely distributes it and when we actually tune into the beauty of this as we stand in His presence we can be completely naked from the pressure of performance for the first time in our lives. Most of us never get there, choosing to stay in what feels safer; a rushed performance under the judgements others have placed on us. Rest for our souls is impossible when we have not learned from Him who is gentle and lowly.
It is much easier to cast a quick judgement than to extend biblical grace. It is easier to subconsciously label and box the failures of others than to consciously extend the genuine grace that creates environments safe enough for raw honesty.
Safe individuals are those who have learned to stand in His embrace of grace.
Safe communities are those who have received radical grace and extend it with open arms of genuine love. They have broken the yoke of other’s expectations and are resting in what is “easy and light.” They have looked straight into the face of the Father in their dark nights of the soul, and seen that He is gentle. They have received His grace so fully they can throw it around like confetti everywhere they go.
And everyone around them basks in the afterglow of joy it brings.
Pure grace inspires deep honesty and it’s only with honesty that we can learn to deal with the reality of suffering. When we deal with the wear of pain on our soul, we expand our heart to feel joy simultaneously, and it’s then we can stand with heads uplifted to His face with His arms around us and our arms around them…your arms around me and my arms around you, all in a radical embrace of grace.
“For from His fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.”
John 1:16
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
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