As you may know, Rich Mullins is one of my favorite musicians. I don't know exactly when I started to really enjoy his music and see the deeper meaning in his songs, but I do know that I owe my knowledge of his music to my mother, who was incredibly touched and blessed by it. So when I was browsing the religious section at Borders, and saw a book with his name on it, I immediately picked it up. "The Ragamuffin Gospel" was the title, written by a man named Brennan Manning. "Are you bedraggled, beat-up, and burnt-out?" the back cover asked me. Well, yes, I thought to myself, I have been feeling a bit burnt-out lately. Truth be told, I had been rather down for the past few weeks. I was struggling with some desires of the heart that weren't being fulfilled in what I felt was the right timing, and on top of it all, I didn't seem to be making any headway spiritually. I mean, I'd been a Christian practically my whole life. Shouldn't I have something to show for it by now? Shouldn't I be a better person, shouldn't I have grown more spiritually? If I was a strong Christian, shouldn't the greatest desire of my heart be to spend time in God's word, to draw closer to Him, and shouldn't I be willing to trust Him implicitly? If I love God, then why do the desires of the world and so many other things pull at me and distract me from His presence? Shouldn't He be enough to satisfy me? Why does my heart burn and ache for things that are so unworthy compared to Him?
Feeling skeptical, I sat down in one of the many arm chairs with which Borders is littered, and began to read. After reading just one page I was hooked. For the next week, I pored over the book, spending maybe an entire hour reading just one chapter, going back and re-reading things that didn't make sense to me, making sure I had noted the most important points. For me, spending an hour on one chapter is ridiculously slow. I tend to speed-read through most books. If a book isn't terribly challenging, it usually only takes me a day or two to finish it, provided of course, nothing else is occupying me at the time. But this book was different. Somehow I knew that there was a great spiritual truth to be grasped within its pages, that what I had been so hungering and thirsting after for so long was to be found among the lengthy, intellectual quotes and quirky reminisces. And so, I continued to read, and as I did, I found out something incredible, something that had been hidden in the pages of scripture but which I had never yet come across. It was something that I had failed to learn in most of the churches I had so far attended. No one had ever made this clear to me before, and the revelation of it took my breath away. And this is it: God, the great, awesome, powerful God who created the heavens and the earth, who orchestrated the universe and placed the stars in the sky, this same God wants me. Not just loves me, or cares about me, even though those are incredible as well, but He actually wants me! Insignificant though I am, wretched though I am, a poor, despicable, filthy, sinful human being I may be, but He wants me. He actually desires me. He loves me with a love that goes beyond my wildest comprehension, beyond anything I could imagine or dream of, beyond the most passionate love ever felt by a human heart. And I am His. His chosen child, bought with his precious blood, and I don't have to earn anything. There is no need for me to prove my self to Him. I don't need to perfect myself before I come to Him, for there is nothing I can do that would be of the least bit of use. To try to justify myself before coming to Him would be as if a little child felt they had to perform several Herculean tasks before running to their Daddy for a hug. Instead, this quote is true a true example of my heavenly Father's feelings for me when I come to Him in prayer.
"A father is delighted when his little one, leaving off her toys and friends, runs to him and climbs into his arms. As he holds his little one close to him, he cares little whether the child is looking around, her attention flitting from one thing to another, or just settling down to sleep. Essentially the child is choosing to be with her father, confident of the love, the care, the security that is hers in those arms. Our prayer is much like that. We settle down in our Father's arms, in his loving hands. Our mind, our thoughts, our imagination may flit about here and there; we might even fall asleep; but essentially we are choosing for this time to remain intimately with our Father, giving ourselves to him, receiving his love and care, letting him enjoy us as he will. It is very simple prayer. It is very childlike prayer. It is prayer that opens us out to all the delights of the kingdom."
For me to feel that I must make myself better before I can go to God in prayer, that I should and must feel guilty when my mind is distracted during prayer, or my thoughts wander during reading His word, is an affront to God's love for me. Instead, I must become like a child. Children are not concerned with what is thought of them. They simply know and trust that their Father loves them, and that is all that matters. To truly trust in God's grace and love for me is to believe that God loves me with every single one of my failings, that if I sat down to dinner with Jesus, who knows every skeleton in my closet, every thought and evil desire in my head, I would still feel accepted and loved by Him.
So, I've finished the Ragamuffin Gospel, and I'm now reading through it again. I've missed this truth of God's grace for so long that I can't afford to overlook any of it. "For grace proclaims the awesome truth that all is gift. All that is good is ours, not by right, but by the sheer bounty of a gracious God. While there is much we may have earned-our degree, our salary, our home and garden, a Miller Lite, and a good night's sleep-all this is possible only because we have been given so much: life itself, eyes to see and hands to touch, a mind to shape ideas, and a heart to beat with love. We have been given God in our souls and Christ in our flesh. We have the power to believe where others deny, to hope where others despair, to love where others hurt. This and so much more is sheer gift; it is not reward for our faithfulness, our generous disposition, or our heroic life of prayer. Even our fidelity is a gift. "If we but turn to God," said St. Augustine, "that itself is a gift of God." My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply love by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it."
