Am I redeemable? Your relationship with the Savior
An intimate relationship with the Lord is critical to healing. It's time to learn more about his saving mission, because you need a savior.
This piece is part of our “Am I?” series on healing and engaging your story. Catch the beginning of the series here, part 2 on what it means to be fully alive here, and part 3 on facing your brokenness here.
As we come to face our brokenness, we learn how our Lord Jesus Christ “casts down to the nether world, and he brings up from the great abyss. No one can escape his hand” (Tobit 13). This is the same Jesus, who — according to Church Father Saint Ephraim the Syrian — “bore His cross and went forth according to the will of Death, such that He might cast down death against his will.” The very same Lord of whom the book of Revelation speaks, “for you were slain; with your blood you purchased for God men of every race and tongue, of every people and nation”.
Jesus, whose name means “God saves”, desires to heal, transform, and redeem your suffering through a personal and deeply intimate encounter with you.
The most important relationship (ever)
I probably just missed it in Sunday school class, but the most fundamental thing (ever) is to cultivate a personal and intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. To have a personal and intimate relationship with the Lord is to acknowledge your need for a savior in life, which, news flash: we all desperately need.
This didn’t become readily apparent to me until I got sick of suffering in isolation. From that point, there was a clear one-step process I had to learn: turn to Jesus and ask for help.
So what does Jesus really care about your suffering? Short answer: He desires to save you from it.
My dear friends, this is the nature, mission, and desire of our Lord, who makes known His glory precisely amidst the utter brokenness, weakness, and darkness of the mess we call humanity: He’s purchased for us the rewards of eternal life with nothing other than the sacrifice of Himself. The best part? He literally is waiting right now for your permission to let Him enter into your heart. It’s high time to invite the Lord into our story and encounter Him in it.
As Church Father Saint Irenaeus spoke of Jesus, “This same God, after His great goodness, poured His compassion upon us, through which compassion ‘the Day-spring from on high has looked upon us, and appeared to those who sat in darkness and the shadow of death, and has guided our feet into the way of peace’” (Luke 1:78).
This, again, is the Lord, who we are told desires to “give you your heart’s desire and fulfill every one of your plans” (Psalm 20). Meaning, if you’re suffering right now and don’t have a personal and intimate relationship with Jesus, you’re doing it wrong.
Here is the real Risen Lord who moves in to bless, heal, and save us; the New Dawn and light of the world who desires to guide our feet into the way of peace:
In the Darkest Hour when all is lost and the full weight of despair and evil amass their darkness in seeming victory against the soul, taking perverse delight in the victory they have all but won, the Lord makes known His Glory. He is but one Man, a single figure alone in the depths of hell, but He has come here once before. His Love reaches to the Heavens, as He scatters the proud in their conceit, hatred and contempt issuing from their mouths, as the Lord lifts up the lowly heart and Gazes into the depths of the soul.
— From a meditation on the saving power of our Lord
This sure seems like a far cry from whatever watered-down variant of a savior we may have been spoon-fed growing up. And while this is not intended as a critique, it’s time to refocus on the beauty, love, and might of an all-powerful Triune God who desperately desires that we encounter Him, love Him, commune with Him, and share His love with others as a force for light in a world mired in darkness. Insofar as we seek healing from the Lord, so must we expend every effort in requesting the Lord’s mercy and help in engaging the darkness of our own story.
But what happens when we can’t or won’t engage our own stories?
Even when you turn from Him, Jesus never ceases to pursue you, so that you might know His infinite Love for you and desire to heal you.
One of the first things I encountered in my conversion was recognizing and acknowledging the need for a savior. I needed help (a lot of it) and was in over my head. And while it took *so long* to come to this realization, I ultimately am eternally grateful for getting hit with the spiritual two-by-four with Jesus’ name and face plastered on it: I had no clue who Jesus really was, nor had I deeply cared until life’s suffering became so unbearable there was nowhere else to turn.
While this may be a classic case of conversion, it needn’t be so difficult. But as Sr. Miriam is fond of sharing, even when we sin against the Lord or fail to turn toward Him, He only sees our pain and still desires to heal us.
This is the Lord, who has an intimate and personal desire to love you, in action:
Amidst the howling and shrill cries of anguish, the Lord has ransomed captive His people and guides them to green pastures and away from the vast darkness. Many have been left behind and they have only tears for bread. Their death is an arrow piercing the heart of the Lord as they turn in their disdain from His loving and tender gaze. Wounded as they are, they withdraw from His advances and touch, their wounded hearts barely animating the rot and decay of their corpses. Their life is gone, their souls haggard and weary. Their eyes sit behind a film of desperation and despair. Fiery battles rage on within them as the Lord cries in anguish for these souls whom He loves. “They do not know my love”, cries the Lord. But for these goes the Lord again unto the depths of hell and suffering, for His love reaches to the heavens and His truth to the skies. He calls to Himself those whom He desires, who minister to Him and serve Him in His quest to bring all souls into His embrace. The darkness resents this and many are lost. But the Head draws closer the Body as His presence draws nearer.
— From a meditation on the saving power of our Lord
As we enter into Lent, let us enter into the desert with the Lord so that He may show us the way to walk and guide our feet into the way of peace. We are redeemable, and our faith must be the same expressed by the Centurion, whose words we mirror at every Mass when we say, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”
“I have come that you might have life” (John 10:10).
Peace from Cor ad Cor.