grace for the good girl

My column for this week's Enterprise.  I blogged in a similar vein almost 2 years ago.

“For seven years I lived like the prodigal son.  God’s grace drew me back.  I wish abortion was not a part of my story…but it is.  It’s the part of my past that the Lord uses to heal and give hope to others.”

                I’m sitting at a conference table in a gray basement room.  It is mid-morning, and the scent of coffee lingers in the air.  There are others at the table with me: a pastor, a nurse, a grandmother, a college student.  Together we learn about abortion from Kay, the self-proclaimed former prodigal.

                That same evening I learn of another prodigal: our pastor speaks on the life of John Newton.  Rev. Key notes the godly instruction that John received from his mother until she died when he was not quite seven years old.  He recounts John’s appalling decline into promiscuity, gambling, drunkenness, and the horrors of the slave trade, followed by his conversion and return to faith in the God his mother had so dearly loved.  We learn that the prodigal once notorious for his profanity became the pastor who penned the lyrics of one of the best-known hymns of all time.  For the second time that day I’m moved to tears as we sing, “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me…”

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                “I feel like I don’t have much to offer.  Like I need a story.”  I’m trembling as I say this, and the lentils that I’m stirring spatter on the stovetop.  My husband leans against the counter and looks at me.  “You don’t have to make up a story, Dear,” he says.

                It’s later that I realize he’s right.  I don’t have to make up a story: I already have one.  It’s true that it’d be stretch to make my story the story of a prodigal.  On the contrary, I’ve always been a “good girl.”  I was raised in a conservative Christian home.  I was an A student from kindergarten through college.  There is no promiscuity in my past, no drunkenness, no deep, dark secrets that I’ve long buried.  B.J. and I regularly hear comments on how beautiful or well-behaved our children are.  Jill trusts me to write this little column every other week.  To all outward appearances, I live a decent life.

                But during His earthly ministry Jesus taught that keeping God’s law required inward as well as outward obedience.  Our Lord equated lust with adultery, and name-calling with murder.  He taught the Pharisees that for all their pious deeds, inwardly they were filthy.  In fact, it is in response to their accusation – “This man receives sinners, and eats with them!” – that Jesus presented the parable of the prodigal son.  And it’s as I read those latter verses of Luke 15 over again that I see myself, after all.  No, not in the prodigal.  In the prodigal’s elder brother, and in the Pharisees that he represents.  Like them, I’m prone to think that my Father’s love is based on my own good deeds and external conduct rather than on His gracious character.  On who I am rather than on Who He is.

                It’s when I’m in bed that night that my sins rise up against me.  Bursts of impatience with my children.  A surly attitude toward my husband.  The squandering of precious time.  Those evil things that I’ve committed – that I wish I wouldn’t do, but still do.  Even more, there are the things that I’ve omitted – the good that I desire to do – that I should do – but don’t.  My lack of faith.  My lack of thankfulness.  My lack of zeal.  Opportunities to share the gospel that I’ve avoided.  The reality that in spite of all I’ve been given spiritually and materially – from my godly upbringing, to a faithful church, to a loving husband and children, to many gifts that I could use to bless others –  I’m prone to discontent and self-centeredness.  To pride. 

 And yet there’s this:  in spite of myself and the little that I’ve done with all that I’ve been given, the God of heaven willed to save a wretch like me. 

                I’m a “good girl.”  The amazing testimony of my life?  There’s grace for me, too.