AN AWESOME PIECE I JUST FOUND ON THE NET....ENJOY!

“Let’s just go for fun! We’ll see how
much we can push their buttons,” Amy
teased her girlfriend, who didn’t like
the idea of hanging around a bunch of
Christians.
“Come on,” Amy insisted. “I hear their
motto is ‘Come as you are.’ I just want
to prove that they’re ‘come as you
are ... unless you’re gay.'”
Amy had been in a nine-year lesbian
relationship that had broken up, leaving
her wondering why her deepest
longings could never be satisfied. She
and Rachel had just started hanging out
when they decided to attend one
Sunday morning.
“I came on a mission to shock people,”
Amy admits. “Rachel and I would hold
hands in front of people, but instead of
the disgusted looks of contempt we
expected, people met eyes with us and
treated us like real people. So we
started coming to church weekly. We
kept moving closer to the front each
week, trying to get a reaction so that
we’d be rejected sooner rather than
later. When we couldn’t shock people,
we stopped trying and started
learning."
“Not long after that, Rachel and I
stopped seeing each other, but I kept
coming to church because I was
searching for something,” Amy admits.
“I definitely wasn’t looking to change. It
wasn’t my lesbian lifestyle that I was
bringing to God, but I wondered if God
had answers to my deeper longings.
Problem was, I didn’t trust God at all!
“The more I listened and learned about
the teachings of Jesus, the more I
started to actually believe that God
really did love me. I heard more and
more about being His masterpiece, and
in time, I actually started to believe it.
The more I believed God actually could
see something of value in me, the more
I trusted Him.”
Over time, Amy slowly opened her
heart and struggles to Christ.
“It took several years, but as I moved
closer and closer to Christ, He gently
took me on a very surprising journey,"
she says. "First, I found out my father
had nine affairs while I was growing up
—a secret that rocked my world. Jesus
began to show me how the roots of my
sexual issues tie together with my dad’s
—I was just like him, using people to
find comfort, life and love outside of
God.”
Amy continued to grow in her
knowledge of the Scriptures, falling
more and more in love with the Lord.
The following year, God had another
surprise for her: “I went to the seminar
called ‘To Be Told,’ hosted at Gateway.
I wanted to see how God could put
closure to my brokenness, but what He
showed me shocked me.”
“As Dan Allender was telling a story of a
bully," Amy recalls, "I suddenly had a
flashback of getting off the school bus. I
lived down the street from Jimmy, a
boy who had bullied me all year. But
this particular day, Jimmy acted nice to
me as I got off the bus.
“He apologized for being so mean, and
he invited me to come to his house.”
That day in the seminar, all else faded
to black as this vivid nightmare crept
back to life. Amy saw herself walking
through Jimmy’s front door, noticing all
the shades pulled down. Startled, she
spied two teenage boys eyeing her with
a ravenous look as the door slammed
shut. Her screams never escaped the
evil darkness that enveloped that
house. They pinned her down and
raped her.
She was only 9!
Amy swam in a pool of tears as the
seminar continued. Others were
oblivious to her divine epiphany. She
realized the Lord had been drawing her
near to strengthen her for this
revelation—to show her the source of
so much sexual struggle hidden for
years beneath layers of protective mud.
“After that, I realized God knows more
about me than I know about myself,”
Amy recalls, “and He wants to bring
healing to these wounds, so I fully gave
Him my heart and body—everything. As
I continued to seek intimacy with Him,
the lesbian struggles fell away. I’m not
saying that’s how God works with
everyone, but it’s how He’s healing me.
The more I focus on God’s intimate love
for me and try to see His masterpiece
emerge, the less I want anything to get
in the way of His work in me.”
Seven years later, Amy leads our
ministry to help people find healing and
wholeness from all kinds of sexual and
relational struggles. She’s helping
others become God’s restored
masterpiece.
Jesus Is Never Shocked
Do you realize that Jesus is not shocked
by the shocking things people do? Jesus
knew Zacchaeus had robbed people
blind and profited off much unethical
behavior, yet Jesus was not shocked.
He did not offer Zach correction, but
relationship: “Come down, Zacchaeus.
I’m staying at your house tonight.” (See
Luke 19:5.) That shocked everyone! Yet
relationship changed Zacchaeus.
Jesus knew that the Samaritan woman
at the well had been married and
divorced five times. He knew about her
current “hookup” and how sexually
entangled she was with the guy she was
living with. (See John 4.) Jesus was not
repulsed. (Samaritans of Jesus’ day
were treated by the religious
community like gay people often get
treated by some of today’s Christian
community.) None of this kept Jesus
away or kept Him from offering her
living water. Maybe Jesus wants Christ-
followers who will be less like the
Pharisees and more like Him—
unshockable.
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Luke tells of a time Simon the Pharisee
invited Jesus to dinner. Jesus and His
disciples went and “reclined at the
table” (Luke 7:36) along with Simon’s
religious friends, who were skeptical
about Jesus’ true identity—mainly
because He showed more love for
“sinners” than love for the Law of
Moses. (Jesus had just made it clear
this wasn’t true; He came to fulfill the
intent of the Law of Moses.) They
invited Jesus there to judge Him, not
learn from Him.
Middle Eastern dining style consisted of
a 1-foot-high table with pillows on the
floor for seating, with people sitting
usually with feet stretched out to the
side or behind them. As the meal
proceeded, an immoral woman crashed
the party. She sheepishly made her way
over to stand behind Jesus. Luke makes
sure we know she had “lived a sinful
life” (v. 37). She did not just have a few
slip-ups, but rather had made a life out
of her sexual deviancies, and everyone
knew it! Her mud was public
knowledge. Her whole life, she had felt
judged and condemned by the religious
establishment, so to go into the house
of her tormentors took enormous
courage.
Yet there she stood ... because Jesus
was there! Somehow word on the
street had traveled to her through the
crowd she hung out with—there’s hope
in Jesus for the muddiest human.
Hearing He had come near, an
unstoppable force welling up from
within had drawn her to His feet. As
she stood in His presence, hope burst
through the dam of all that pain that
had driven her mudslinging behavior—
she started to cry. Her tears
accidentally landed on Jesus’ dirty feet
(that His host had not shown the
common courtesy to wash).
The tension in the room mounted;
everyone’s shoulders tightened as she
fell to her knees behind Jesus, bent
down and wiped His wet, dirty feet with
her hair. She took out a bottle of oil
mixed with perfume, took the oil in her
hands and gently stroked His feet with
the oil—kissing them as she anointed
Him with the perfume.
Jesus just sat there, never flinching,
eyes fixed on the Pharisees, watching
them react in shock and disbelief—
flames of contempt shooting out of
their merciless eyes.
Simon could stand it no more. This
outrageous scene had proven his point.
He muttered to himself and his “more
respectable” guests, “If this man were a
prophet, he would know who is
touching him and what kind of woman
she is—that she is a sinner” (v. 39).
In other words, if Jesus were truly a
prophet, He would know about her
scandalous sexual sin, and He would be
shocked. But Jesus did know and was
not shocked!
Now, you have to realize this was a
controversial situation. Imagine a
known prostitute coming up to your
pastor, kissing his feet and rubbing oil
on them after the Sunday service. It
would be his last Sunday at most
churches if he didn’t put an end to it
fast! What was Jesus thinking? Why
didn’t this shock Jesus like it would all
of us?
Jesus looks at the heart. It’s about the
heart. Jesus confronted the unloving
hearts of His host and friends while this
woman demonstrated a heart
overflowing with love. Jesus said,
“Simon, I have something to tell
you” (v. 40).
“Two people owed money to a certain
moneylender. One owed him five
hundred denarii [a whole lot of money],
and the other fifty [one tenth as much].
Neither of them had the money to pay
him back, so he forgave the debts of
both. Now which of them will love him
more?”
Simon replied, “I suppose the one who
had the bigger debt forgiven.”
“You have judged correctly,” Jesus said.
(The only thing Simon had judged
correctly that day!)
Then He turned toward the woman and
said to Simon, “Do you see this woman?
I came into your house. You did not
give me any water for my feet, but she
wet my feet with her tears and wiped
them with her hair. You did not give
me a kiss, but this woman, from the
time I entered, has not stopped kissing
my feet. You did not put oil on my
head, but she has poured perfume on
my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many
sins have been forgiven—as her great
love has shown. But whoever has been
forgiven little loves little” (Luke 7:41–
47)
It’s all about love! Don’t miss this very
critical point Jesus makes to us all: If
you truly recognize how much it cost
God to forgive you, it will flood your
heart with love for God and others who
need more of the same.
It’s all about love! Not a love that
ignores the mud and the damage that
destroys God’s Masterpiece, but a love
that recognizes how much loving mercy
God has given a messed-up person like
me!
That great love brings grace and truth
together to give hope to a broken world
in need of forgiveness and restoration.