Imagine you’re sitting in the middle of a darkened room, so dim and dingy that you can’t see a thing. You’re battle-weary, defeated and angry, stagnant and comfortably alone in your hurt. When all of a sudden, through the gruesome blackness, there’s a fragment of light. You’ve been in the dark for so long that the smallest hint of anything luminous strains your eyes. You have to bring your hand to cover your gaze, as the light is too much to bear. Little by little, pieces of this peculiar light begin to flood the area around you, revealing all of your festering wounds and massive failures. This astounding realization triggers within you the desire to run and hide, but just as you get up to leave, there’s a man sitting next to you that you hadn’t noticed before. Unlike you, squinty-eyed and broken, His eyes are wide open and full of kindness. He’s looking at you expectantly, excitedly, like He’s been waiting for you to notice His presence the entire time. He smiles, and as He reaches out His hands toward you, you are drawn to His peaceful disposition and uncanny gentleness. Before you realize what’s happening, your feet slowly begin to move toward this man who holds the kind of acceptance you’ve never experienced before. As you approach His presence, you notice the Light shining brighter, as you soon understand that the closer you get, the more exposed you become. Distracted, you look down at yourself, and stop dead in your tracks. You have a choice to make: turn back in fear of rejection or step forward in bold, broken surrender. 

If you remember a few weeks ago, I came to you in the dark with Psalm 139. I explained that we don’t have to meet Jesus in the dark because He has already met us exactly where we are. I invited all of us to become aware of His presence with us in our present darkness; to not hide away, but receive His Light and know that our darkness is not dark to Him. If you’re ready and willing, I want us to go back to that passage and dig a little deeper because I think there’s so much truth that He wants to share with us in love through this Scripture. I want us to dig into what our responses should look like when we encounter God in the middle of our lowest valley. 

How do we face the God of the Universe, the One True King, the Ultimate Light, with our dirty hands and aching heart? We reach daringly toward the unmasking of our vulnerability and turn away from our innate human desire to be pridefully covered. Vulnerability is being submissively brave enough to lay down all of who you are, the good, the bad and the ugly, with an overcoming faith that you will be met with healing grace. This kind of bravery doesn’t look pretty. It’s not wrapped up in sleek, black armor with a shiny, new sword. It’s not instantaneous, but can be a slow and stiff process. This kind of bravery feels grotesque and is executed with shaking hands, a racing heart and eyes filled with tears of uncertainty. This kind of courage requires massive amounts of mercy and grace, and could possibly be one of the hardest battles you face. Why? Because this battle isn’t won with a confident stride into victory, as you lead the charge to worldly triumph. No, this battle is won on your knees as you soften yourself enough to bow down in strength through brokenness, reaching for the hand of your Creator and Healer as he touches those places within you that you’ve been too afraid to face. Vulnerability is the purest, hardest form of humility because it requires the revealing of your lowest valleys and darkest hurts, as you blindly trust the One on the receiving end of your full, imperfect self. Vulnerability is a total gut-wrenching, heartbreaking, beautiful surrender, and it is the very key to your freedom from the dark.

I know that a lot of us have been taught that surrender is the equivalent of cowardly weakness. Pick your head up, pretend like the impending darkness around you isn’t a bother, and cover those gashes. Why? Because it’s better to be perceived as “strong” and “untouchable” rather than display your human imperfections. Trust me, I get it. The very word “vulnerable” makes me cringe, and it is something I struggle with daily. It’s so easy to walk around guarded like we have it all together, like we make the rules. It’s harder to admit that we can’t do it alone, that we’re weak, that we need to walk in that place of surrender to self and God. We get distracted from the breathtaking beauty of vulnerable surrender when we turn our gaze from the Light to ourselves. The minute we choose to look down, and remain focused on ourselves, the harder it gets to take steps toward those healing fragments of Light. The Light will always remain intimidating as long as we choose to focus on those failures instead of the healing power of Jesus.

The ability to be completely honest and open with the God who already knows our darkest moment is an act of humble obedience that has the power to reshape our entire lives. It is through those moments of tenderness with the Father that He is able to reach into those dusty corners of our hearts and bring them back to life. He quite literally turns on the Light within us as we fix our gaze on Him instead of the darkness surrounding us. 

Take a look at Psalm 139, verses 1 – 6,

“Lord, you have searched me and known me. 

You know when I sit down and when I stand up; 

you understand my thoughts from far away. 

You observe my travels and my rest; 

you are aware of all my ways. 

Before a word is on my tongue, 

you know all about it Lord. 

You have encircled me; you have placed your hand on me. 

This wondrous knowledge is beyond me. 

It is lofty; I am unable to reach it.”

Warriors, I know how terrifyingly uncomfortable it is to retrain yourself to remove the focus from your failures to the One that is faultless. Or maybe for you it’s training yourself to face those faults, forcing  yourself to look at them through the lens of Jesus. It feels awkward and out of place to move toward the Light when you are harboring feelings of unworthiness, when you know you have things in your life that are undealt with. I understand how hard it can be for some of us to admit we’re wrong. I am one of them! I can see the difficulty in reaching for help because you’re unsure of what will happen next. I’m one of those too! I am probably one of the most guarded people you would ever meet, but I have learned that when I allow the presence of Jesus to captivate my heart the way He wants to, I am the strongest I have ever been. I am softened, filled with compassion and gentleness instead of rage and self-righteousness. My words become different and my heart is changed because I made the choice to be real with a God that already sees all of my massive faults. 

Psalm 139 is a clear and exquisite picture of how well God knows us. He’s not just an acquaintance, or someone that thinks of you one minute and then moves on to someone else the next. He is completely and utterly captivated by you all of the time, even in those moments that you are altogether unaware of His presence. 

My favorite part of this Psalm is verse 5, “You have encircled me; you have placed your hand on me.” The word “encircled” has fascinated me all week. Here is what I found when I googled its exact definition: “to surround, encompass, hem in, form a ring around, form a barrier around.” Did you catch that last part? He encircles you! He forms a barrier around you and completely surrounds you! He is your protection from the failures and wounds that you are trying so desperately to run from. Friend, you have absolutely everything to gain from being vulnerably humble with a God that already encircles you. Because of this grace, we can approach His throne with bold confidence, knowing He will never reject us. Why? Because you are fully known, completely encircled by a King that has created a safe barrier around you in order to encourage you to give Him those hurts that are keeping you from freedom. Your God is behind you, next to you, and in front of you, just waiting for the sweet moment that you finally notice His presence in the dark.