If anyone understands chastening, I think I do.

In fact, ever since I decided to follow Him, my life has been a paradoxical mixture of pain and comfort, confidence and humility, embarrasment and joy, small successes, amplified failures.

It's true I make bad choices and have to live with the consequences. Sometimes things happen to me (most times relational things) that cause pain and then ugly stuff rises to the surface and I make bad choices, justifying them because I was the victim. Sometimes I am the perpetrator and can't use that excuse. All of it seems to be getting alot of gunk out of my heart I didn't know was there till something happens/doesn't happen that brings it out.

Some folks may consider me unsaved because of what I just described. Those same folks may never have experienced what I just described. I can't say. But my doubts aren't about belonging to Him. My doubts are sometimes about His goodness (yes, I am saved). When I am going through something He ordains to reveal something about me I didn't want to know, I doubt His goodness….and that is sin. But I realize that. Sometimes I realize I can't repent of what I know is wrong. I grit teeth and can murmer the words, but the heart is torn up. Out of frustration simply pray that He can change me at the deepest level so I can let go of that square inch of real estate I have kept to myself.

My image of Him is nothing at all like a strict School Master, even though I do get that image from my own imagination and some of His own kids. I see Him as a loving Surgeon who cuts and cuts, knowing exactly what it takes to heal a sicko like me. I don't like the cuts, but I realize He has to do it and as long as He is in charge I can deal with it a little better.

I consider the process of sanctification to be a long drawn out bout of chemotherapy, rather than marching up a hill with sword in one hand and shield in the other. The only difference between real chemotherapy and this, is that I am guaranteed success, even if it seems elusive at times.

The cuts and the chemo are seen more as love now, just as much as the abundance I never asked for. He is just a wonderful Father…mainly because His kid is a screw up, yet He has never locked me out of the house or sent me to bed without food.

Anyway, I didn't read the rest of your text and when I did, I felt I didn't even broach the essence of your post, and wanted to.

It is stressed, but it could mean one of two things:
1) We need to fulfill it
2) We need to believe in the only One who has

If 1 is impossible, which it is, then 2 is all you have and it is more than enough, because weight of obligation is replaced by gratitude for the free gift of grace and unconditional love given you. If someone pulls your car out of a bar ditch and refuses payment, you probably would offer lunch. Multiply that by about a billion and you understand obedience in terms of the Gospel.

Take a look at Galatians 3 and 4.

That one step enabled me to feel the love of God and his freedom. Reading your book has been a great encouragement and helped me to "widen my vision" of God's freedom. Thanks for putting it down on paper! Thanks also for preaching the message of God's love and freedom.

IT CHANGED MY LIFE. I had been thinking about some of the things that Steve was saying in his book, but Steve took it much further. The first time I read it, I found myself saying, "nah, this isn't right." However, I kept coming back and reading. I thought about the things said in the book for about 2 weeks and then I read it again. Then, I tried to get everyone that I knew to read it. I am still doing it today. Every new person that I meet is told about this book.

Thank you, Steve, Erik, and everyone else for putting this on the site. Thank you, Steve for writing the book. Am I completely free? Nope, and don't think that I will ever be completely free in this body, but I am a whole lot freer than I was. I am getting freer everyday. I am just neurotic enough keep going until I get it perfect.

Cheers,
Regular Jeff