Condemnation and Car Rides

We've all heard this before: "there is no condemnation in Christ! Tell your past to be gone!"
What? Is this some sort of magic trick? I can just wish my struggles away? I can command my past to flee?
This is a joke.
Jesus doesn't mean that we will never struggle again once we are Christians. He doesn't mean that because we change our life that our old one simply disappears and all the baggage that comes along with it is no more.
No. The past is real. Your struggle is real.
Jesus says "There is therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus; the old is gone the new has come!"
He doesn't mean, "Well, all the people you've hurt before don't remember that you hurt them and oh that eating disorder you had, I got that all covered you will never suffer from insecurity again."
Jesus knows we will fall.
He knows we will fail.
He knows we might take a small drink again.
He knows we might visit that website again.
He knows we might skip a day of eating again.
He knows we might hurt people again.
He knows we might lash out in anger against our spouse again.
He knows, but He has paid the price of your shame.
He sees His children as the small weak children we are, so desperately in need of grace and rescuing.

Jesus is like the father witnessing his child learn to walk on its own. It's so unsure of everything, yet gets into everything it can touch. It bumps into the precious heirlooms, breaking a few irreplaceable pieces of china along the way. It cries from confusion in its new ability and doesn't understand why dad smacks its hand away from the untouchables. The father helps the child around, holding its hands, steering it from harm, sometimes the stubborn child approaches danger despite its fathers subtle warnings. The child is confident in its own ability to walk straight and ends up face planted into the hard concrete.
The father does not leave the child screaming for help. The father does not pick the child up, spanking and scolding the child. The father does not say, "Son, I told you so! See, you fell now get back up on your own!"
No. No.
The father runs to his child, scooping him up in his arms kissing and cuddling the child into his neck saying, "shhhh...daddy's here. He's here. I know, I know."

We are like this child, learning to walk on our new spiritual legs. We ignore warnings. We trip. We fall. We get beat up.

But my God is not the God that turns His face from one of His children because they fell while learning to walk.
He knows we are weak.
He knows we need a Savior.
He knows we need mercy time and time again.

Sometimes the enemy comes in like a flood and bombards my heart with guilt, shame, fear, confusion.
But my Daddy comes in like a whisper while I'm riding in my car on the freeway.
The rain runs down my front window as I blare my music as loud as I can to shut out every demon that has its eye set on me that day.

My Daddy sits in the passenger seat and touches my face with His Grace and reassurance.
"You are MY daughter, not the daughter of shame. You are MY child, not the child of fear. You are captivatingly beautiful in My eyes, not an invisible insecure girl like you sometimes see. You are strong because I am. You are brave because you are mine. You are mine."

Jesus never promised easy.
He never promised we'd always love the Christian walk and all it entails.
He never promised the world would go soft on us.
He never promised the enemy would stop fighting to entrap our hearts.

Take heart, for He has overcome the world.
Take heart, for He has overcome the addictions only you know about.
Take heart, for you are worth far more than many sparrows.
I know my past is real.
I know my struggle is real.
But I know Daddy's here.

Romans 8:1-4 (NIV)
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, [2] because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. [3] For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, [4] in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.