To say "Yes."

One year ago, I had God in a box.

It was a small box that fit comfortably into life defined on my terms. I told Him what He could and couldn’t touch – “My patience could use a little work, but don’t go around stirring up any convictions, please” – and the box was mostly built of "no"s. Like, "No, don't show me that." "No, don't touch that." "No, don't go around changing anything." Because my box wouldn’t allow Him to show me otherwise, a relationship with Christ was little more to me than having a reason to feel guiltier than most when I messed up.

Thankfully, God is in the business of breaking down walls – including the ones I had set up around Him.

            At the beginning of my senior year, I became aware of the paradox I had lived my whole life: all my needs and most of my wants were met, but I felt undeniably unfulfilled. Joy was slippery and fleeting and I was so tired of chasing it. I wanted something that could and WOULD sustain me. So I picked up a bible and decided to try out taking Jesus a little more seriously – and then I retreated, fast and hard.

I had things I was holding onto! My relationships, my plans – I needed those things manageably in my hands. Jesus was holding out His hand to me, and I was happy to take it…until I realized my hands were already full. Non-negotiably full. No, no, no.

Well, surely second or third place in my heart was better than no place in my heart, right? Surely. And with that, I secured the steering wheel of my life safely back into my own hands and asked Jesus to please take the passenger seat. And to not backseat drive.

That was kind of like trying to admire a really poor carbon copy of a really spectacular piece of art. I knew there was something to it…and I knew I was getting a wimpy fraction of the experience.

The walls I had built up around God were obstructing my efforts to get closer to Him, but I pretended like I didn’t know that. I allowed myself to believe there was something inherently wrong with me, that God just wasn’t as interested in me as He was in others, or that I just wasn’t cut out to be IN LOVE with Him.

I spent a lot of time dancing around those walls, trying to figure out a way to keep them up but still get close. And then one night, I sang the words “I am Yours” – and I cried. I realized I wanted so badly to mean it, to be able to sing those words and feel FREEDOM instead of jealousy towards the people who did. I wanted to finally say "Yes," and mean it. Just to see what it tasted like.

But getting to that point would require loosening a pretty tight grasp.

How could Jesus POSSIBLY make me feel more secure than my own plans could? How could He BEGIN to fill these bottomless holes I’ve been expertly patching over my whole life? He OBVIOUSLY doesn’t know me, or know how to make me happy, because He’s asking me to give up such big pieces of who I am. (Clarification: who I thought I was.)

You know what it was? He was calling me out upon the water. (Are you singing “Oceans” yet?) He was inviting me to step out of the boat. To say "Yes." Jesus was out there; I was here. Still in His presence, still adored beyond measure…but if I wanted to get closer to Jesus, I would have to step out of my boat.

People, if you never, ever listen to another word I say for the rest of my life, please hear this:

It was worth it.

It was worth it.

It was WORTH it!

Here’s the best way I can describe it:

After goofing around long enough with the “carbon copy version” of God, I realized I didn’t want some lukewarm courtship with Christ. Why bother ascribing to His higher standard of character if you aren’t going to open up your hands and receive the incredible extravagance of GRACE and love and peace and COMPLETE fulfillment He offers you? I didn’t want to simply live with the awareness that there is a fuller way to experience life; I wanted to experience it, too.

God invites us into a profoundly deep relationship with Himself. He would have let me go my whole life calling my own shots – we were, after all, given free will – but He loved me enough to respond to my initially feeble, 2% effort of figuring Him out by ever so slowly and ever so gently opening up my eyes to the abundance that’s available in a relationship with Him, and then showing me the way there...that is, to simply say "Yes."

Sure, there was difficulty – yeah, there was pain. But how much can this Jesus really be worth if He costs you nothing? If He leaves your life exactly the way He found it? If He, in His infinite knowledge of both your heart and the future, lets you stumble around in the dark without offering direction? Or correction, where He knows it’s needed?

It’s scary – believe me, I get it. The notion of being asked to give up or set aside XYZ makes you defensive and panicky, and suddenly Jesus seems like a really demanding guy, and a deeper relationship with Him doesn’t sound worth it at all.

It reminds me of getting splinters when I was a kid – this splinter is hurting you, and people insist that you’ll feel better if you remove it… But pulling it out will be painful. And that’s scary. I threw some WILD anti-splinter-removal tantrums in my day (perhaps not surprisingly, I'm really glad my parents never let me keep a splinter.)

But I need you to know God’s a gentleman. He never threatened to love me less, or to stop extending grace towards me if I didn’t make the choice to follow Him wholeheartedly by saying "Yes." He let me take my time. It was 100% MY choice. And it was one of the hardest choices I’ve ever had to make, but when the time came, He made me able.

I want you to hear this, too: He’s faithful, y’all. He’s so faithful. I stepped out of that boat and didn’t even have time to acknowledge the wind or the waves before He reached out His arms to support me.

And I’m not special. I’m really not. I wasn’t groomed for this. I’m not worthy because of something I did or something I didn’t do. He doesn’t love me any more than He loves anyone reading this. Or not reading this. Or smiling at this, or smirking at this, or whatever.

What I’m getting at is this: He’s pursuing your heart, too. Where ever you're at.

While I was searching, I was greatly impacted by the way I saw the lives of those around me being changed. So I’m writing this. And I’m sharing it with you. And if you’re wondering if He is worth saying "yes" to, if He is worth the things you might have to give up in order to gain an intimate relationship with Him……to say "yes" to Jesus is to break chains, to open doors, and to take the first step on the most incredible journey you'll ever take. It’s totally, unquestionably, completely worth it. Trust me.

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“I do not at all understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us.” – Anne Lamott