The Best I Can Do--reconcilation and forgiveness

Sin, repentance and confession. In this secular world, sin is not a popular word.  People often explain sin as "missing the mark", or making a mistake.  For much of my life, I squirmed away from the idea of sin because I didn't want to admit there was something wrong with me.   I did NOT want to hear about sin and repentance from some person in a fancy robe standing in front of me. I felt that if I lived a good life and treated people right, I wasn't a sinner.  Ironic then, that an experience of sin and grace helped lead me to the Episcopal Church.

In Praying Shapes Believing by Leonel J. Mitchell, the author says, “The goal of the confessor’s counsel and direction is not to remove the symptoms of sin but to root out the disease--the cancer--of sin itself from the soul by the power of the redeeming love of Christ.  Reconciliation is not a program for self-improvement but an opening of the soul to salvation and redemption through the Paschal Mystery.  This opening to Salvation might also be described as taking place through the Blood of the Cross, or by grace through faith. (202).

Note that Mitchell says church is “not a program for self-improvement”. I worked hard on  self-improvement.  I went to a church where we talked about self-improvement; we had seminars on minimizing our carbon footprint, acting out social justice, building a loving community, classes taught by psychologists on “how to be a mature person”.  I took it seriously.  I read, meditated, I exercised to relieve stress, I focused on a positive attitude, I took the Bodhisattva vow, and treated others as I wanted to be treated.  It all helped.  Except when it didn’t.

Except when I was petty, mean, impatient, deceitful, dishonest, impatient, snarky, depressed, anxious…  What the heck?  I must not have been very good at “self-improvement”, right?  I must not have been very good at becoming a better person.

Outwardly, you might say I was doing pretty well.  I worked with children with special needs, I tried to raise my kids responsibly, I took good care of animals, I gave to charity, I loved my husband, I treated people kindly, I voted, I volunteered, I cut my grass and waved at the neighbors.  I had life figured out, right?  Still, my efforts to be “a better person” fell short as often as they hit the mark.  How come I, a person who seemed to “have it together”, was still a mess?  In all the striving, I never realized the grace I longed for was given as a gift.  It didn’t mean I was going to be “a good person”, but it did mean that I was loved and forgiven, no matter what.

After several years of marriage, my husband and I had “the Big Fight”.  It was pretty much the same fight we’d been having for years, over the same issues.  The details aren’t important, but if you’re in a relationship, you probably know what “Big Fight” I mean.  It always ended with one of us (usually me) promising to do better, to be kinder, to work harder, and to clean the house more often.  After years of making promises and always falling short, I finally said, “What if I can’t?  What if this is the best I can do?  What if, for the rest of our lives together, this is how I am?  Do you still want me?”  His answer, (thank God), was “Yes.”  You know what’s funny, we have NEVER had that same fight again.  We have had other fights, about loading the dishwasher and eating all the ice cream, but never “the Big Fight” again.  What changed?

Well, I can honestly say I did think of him more often, I did open up with things I would have kept closed and I did clean the house just a little bit more often.  It wasn’t because I had promised to do it. (I had tried it and that didn’t work).  The change in our daily life came organically.  I finally could rest in the knowledge of our love.  Rather than thinking that I needed to clean the toilets to avoid a fight or avoid “getting in trouble”, I cleaned the toilets because they were dirty.  When judgment dissipated, love remained.  I knew our marriage wasn't going away, so I might as well get to work.

This moment of marital stress is, for me, an example of God’s grace.  After trying and trying to make myself worthy and failing myself and God again and again, I asked God the same question.  When I stopped “trying to be a better person”, when I admitted my ineptitude, my greed, my selfishness, my SIN, and asked, “Do you still want me?”, the answer from God was “Yes”.  

Confessing sin isn’t a prescription to be a better person, or to get my life together.  My life might be a complete mess, but I still have God’s love.  There is nothing I can do to earn it, nothing I can do to deserve it, nothing I can do to pay it back.  The idea of grace, the "opening of my soul to salvation and redemption" snuck up on me slowly, nagged me, romanced me into a relationship with God in Christ.  Surprisingly, while thinking of the love of Christ in my heart, I act a little more lovingly, a little more patiently, a little more generously, a little more honestly.  

I am not going to clean the toilets of my soul in order to earn forgiveness.  I might as well clean them, though, because they are dirty.  Since God in Christ is dwelling in my soul and in my life, I might as well clean up a little bit for him.