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Safe Haven for Teens is a organization that focuses at this time on providing teens with a safe place to hang before school, where they get a free breakfast and a place to talk. In the summer we will be moving into providing a afternoon place for the teens to hang where they can do art, skate board, music and hang out. |
The Struggle with God's Grace
The ability to abide in God’s grace seems to be a mystery, or a lofty ideal that too many people struggle with fully attaining. The truth is that even though most Christians today believe that they are saved by God’s grace they still struggle with the concept of works, and many find themselves feeling unworthy. In this mindset, the reality of grace is only a doctrinal truth but it is not a relational one, it is believed in but not lived out. In order to understand the awesome qualities of God’s grace it is important to first look at what grace is not, or in other words "dysgrace."
A person who struggles with the concept of dysgrace is usually someone who is caught up in what is commonly called the performance trap. The performance based Christian life comes from the malignant virus of sinful pride – a pride that encourages us to build our lives upon a deadly lie. Such prideful self-reliance is the very opposite of grace. The misunderstanding of grace usually comes from our parents or caregivers. A proper understanding of grace can only happen during the important developmental years to unconditional acceptance, physical and emotional nurture, stability, love and discipline. This requires parents of godly character who demonstrate righteousness, loving-kindness, and predictable graciousness. Parents are the most effective communicators of truths, values, concepts, and lifestyles, because they incarnate them in concrete relationships. The reality is all parents have failed in raising their children perfectly, in one degree or another, in the understanding of God’s grace, no matter how hard they tried.
In many instances when we did not receive a healthy emotional response to our needs we developed a false superself, which is an idealized image, a fantasy, or a false picture of self. This is an attempt to get our needs filled, so we can feel pleasing, accepted, loved and unique. The problem begins when this idealized self becomes our chief goal by consuming all emotional and spiritual energies. In other words it becomes our search for glory. As our search continues we gradually move from "I’m unique," to "I’m special," to "I’m better." We will also find that our needs become claims upon others by holding onto the lie of "I’m entitled to." This never-ending battle becomes the tyranny of the "oughts"; an overhanging sense of guilt and condemnation; a high level of anxiety; a sense of low self-esteem from constant self-belittling; denial and repression of negative emotions such as anger or depression; and a legalism and scrupulosity resulting from a damaged, oversensitive conscience.
The end result is that we find ourselves caught in false perfectionistic solutions. These can be summed up in three possible personality patterns. The first is the mastery personality, where they have an excessive need for self-esteem (moving against people). These people have a need for power, personal achievement, admiration, prestige, and recognition. They also have a need to feel superior. The lie they tend to believe is: "If I am strong and dominate people, they can’t hurt me." The second is the self-effacement personality, where they have an excessive need to belong (moving toward people). These people appear weak, helpless, overdependent, compliant, submissive and loving. They have a need for approval and they fear disapproval. The lie they tend to believe is, "I will do anything if you’ll just love me; for it you love me, then you won’t hurt me." The last personality pattern is one of resignation, where they have an excessive need for control (move away from people). They appear detached, resigned, over independent, and unassailable. They have a need to feel invulnerable. The lie they tend to believe is: "I am fine, I don’t need you."
As we seek and understand the definition of the term “self” we can more fully understand the struggle. The word self is used in the positive sense of basic personhood, the self-God intended us to be – imperishable, indestructible, and of eternal value in His sight. A person who struggles from parental dysgrace needs emotional healing prayer and a retraining of their thought patterns. The hardest part of the performance trap is for the person to change their mindset, because even though there is a sincere desire to change a Christian can only find help and healing through God’s strength. It is very important that we realize it will take much time and energy to retrain our thought process. It will be crucial for us and those around us to be patient and loving during this process.
It is important to understand that almost everyone struggles with this need to perform to some degree or another. The syndrome itself is a kind of disease, a malignant virus at the heart of every human being. It is the ultimate lie behind myriads of ordinary lies, persuading us that every relationship in life is based on performance, that is, on what we do. This lie insists that everything depends on how well we perform – our salvation and status with God, our sense of self-worth and our relationship to ourselves, our sense of security and belongingness – our relationship with others and our sense of achievements and success – our relationship with society around us.
There is good news however, no matter how big the gap God desires to be in a relationship with us. Notwithstanding the hopelessness of our predicament, God has found a way to bridge the gap and restore us to a relationship with Himself, and to bring healing to the damaged areas of our personalities. According to Paul in the Phillips translation he says:
Though sin is shown to be wide and deep, thank God His grace is wider and deeper still! The whole outlook changes – sin used to be the master of men and in the end handed them over to death; now grace is the ruling factor, with righteousness its purpose and its end the bringing of men to the eternal life of God through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 5:20-21).
God’s love is found in His grace in action on our behalf, freely giving us His forgiveness, His acceptance, and His favor. It is motivated only by God’s love for us and not because of any worthiness or deservedness on our part. God’s love for us is unconditional; it is not a love drawn from God by something good in us. It flows out of God because of His nature. God’s love is an action toward us, not a reaction to us. His love depends not on what we are but on what He is. He loves because He is love.
The whole central theme for grace is found throughout the New Testament in Paul’s writings. Paul was best known as the Apostle of Grace because of the 155 New Testament passages on grace, 133 belong to him. The central understanding of grace evolves around the concept of my salvation being freely given based solely on what Christ did for me on the cross, not at all based on what I have done or ever could do. The concept of grace continues to be very difficult for me. I have grown up in a world of dysgrace and I continually feel like I have to do something in order to earn even a right to inhabit the space my body takes up. It is a concept and idea that I will marvel and struggle with to some degree until I get to the other side.
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