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In worship, as we finished up the “i Quit” message series I shared an argument I’d had with my therapist. Over the time I’d spent in therapy he’d helped me identify that I have “fear of abandonment.” Because of the situations I’ve faced in my life, I have a deep sense of mistrust in those around me. I assume they will be in my life for just a short amount of time, peek behind the “magic curtain of Andrea” and realize that I’m not worth their sticking around. Then they’ll bail.
Once he identified that with me, I clung to that as my reality. That was my “truth.” Time passed by, life circumstances continued to change, and I found myself sitting there one afternoon very disillusioned by some current situations I was facing.
“Everyone always abandons me so why should I invest in building new relationships? They are just going to leave. Everyone always leaves.”
After my sad, Eyeore-like diatribe, he stopped me. “That simply isn’t true anymore and you cannot continue with that narrative. Not everyone that loves you leaves you. Yes, you’ve encountered that in your life, but that was your past. Now you are in your present. It is time for you to embrace your new life and new truth. Quit clinging to the old truth.”
Truth – especially new truths – they set us free.
There’s a story in the Gospel of John about a man who had been blind from birth. The disciples with him asked him whose sin caused the man’s blindness, his sin or his parents. Jesus told him, “You’re asking the wrong question. You’re looking for someone to blame. Instead, look for what God can do!”
Jesus said this, made a paste from his saliva and dust and told the man to go wash in the pool. He went, he washed, and he saw!
The town was all out of sorts – they couldn’t believe that this new man was the blind beggar. They started peppering him with questions. He ended up being marched to the religious leaders who were incensed that Jesus healed the man on the Sabbath. They continued to berate him with questions . . . until he said,
“I know nothing about that one way or another. But I know one thing for sure: I was blind . . . I now see.”
The blind man embraced a new truth. After he saw clearly, he began to love and admire Jesus, which led him to follow more nearly. Where in your life are you clinging to old truths?
Where do you need to embrace new truths so that the light of life can permeate your entire being and push you to experience life in its fullness and joy?
The story ends with the religious leaders throwing the blind/now seeing man into the street. Jesus goes to him and asks him if he believes. He affirms that he does – it is his new truth and it did indeed set him free.
John 10:39
“I came into the world to bring everything into the clear light of day, making all the distinctions clear, so that those who have never seen will see, and those who have made a great pretense of seeing will be exposed as blind.”
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