I Am The Unfaithful

I am the unfaithful.

These are the words of fierce truth though unspoken reality which have been plaguing at the backside and inside and outside of my mind. 

I am the unfaithful.

When I think about and consider the identifiers that seem, perhaps not the truest but, in fact, the most accurate and honest, only one such rings through.  When I reflect on my inadequacies and insufficiencies (I’m rather gifted in this sort of reflection), when I see myself in light who and what I wish I saw and what and who really stands before me, I see one not nearly so faithful as the one she wishes to so appear...

I am the unfaithful…

After relocating a previous new year’s post, I considered writing a blog to bring in the new year…only to realize I had only blogged nine times in 2013 and one of those was a reposting.  It, in fact, fed into the current stream.  I recognized it fresh and anew... 

I am the unfaithful.

I perused my journal…the free space of my most private thoughts…as I often due at the end of the year.  I read through.  I look for patterns, connections, changes, truths.  I conclude my year and I begin again.  Less than a dozen typed pages were there for me to read.  (Other years had months that were low if I only wrote 12 pages!).  There were no thoughts on my days or my weeks.  There was no exchanged interchange as God and I considered together where we were and what life was about. 

I am the unfaithful.

I repacked my year-long devotional as I gathered pieces from my holiday break.  The one that is still only half read.  And I packed next to it the prayer journal from two years ago.  The one with only the first 23 pages written it…detailing maybe a handful more scattered days. 

I am the unfaithful.

I emptied my bible of the remaining bulletins I had yet to throw away or pass on...from a half of a dozen churches still.  All visited.  All left me dry, longing, wanting, and un-refreshed and unfilled.  All were neglected without a second visit.  All uncommitted to.  All leaving me uncommitted to church as a whole.

I am the unfaithful.

The stacks of books I didn’t read.  The photo album still left undone. With the pictures that were never taken. The letters unwritten and the cards unsent.  The visits that never happened.  The correspondence lost.  The elliptical with only a quarter of the miles I had hoped to put on it.  The 5K I still can’t run. The prayers I forgot to pray and the passages I never read. 

From the petty to the real.  For the intricate to the mundane.  I feel as if I have faithfully completed…nothing.  And it makes me wonder…

Have I faithfully responded to anything at all?

Have I been where God needs me to be?  Have I listened to His still sure voice?  Have I acted out of wisdom and in love?  Have I journeyed with peace and joy and perseverance?  Have I continued with surrender, demonstrated trust?  Was I simply kind without it being an expectation? Was I firm in my convictions and gentle in their outsourcing? Was I patient in affliction?  Faithful in prayer? Where was I faithful?

Or was I faithful at all?

Have I stayed out of fear? Have I led out of pride?  Have I encouraged out of selfish ambition?  Have I given with expectation?  Have I endeavored without humility?  Have I pursued without honesty?  Have I spoken without belief?  Lived without hope?  Have I hidden behind hypocrisy and lies?

After all, I am the unfaithful…

I try hard.  But effort doesn’t always equal faithfulness.  And I think I try hard and want to say I try hard but do I try hard enough? …Or is that also a place where I prove once again that I’m the unfaithful?

Sometimes I look into the mirror and want to echo David in Psalm 12 in stating “Help, Lord, for no one is faithful anymore; those who are loyal have vanished from the human race…”  For surely it is me.

I know Israel’s history.  I know they are the only ones perhaps intrinsically more unfaithful than I am.  And I know God doesn’t tolerate unfaithfulness.  For He IS faithful.  And He calls His people as His own and with His own.  He calls us to respond with faithfulness.  “Be sure to fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart; consider what great things he has done for you.” (1 Samuel 12:24).  When I reflect on the God who Is...what other choice do I have but to respond?

Except I still manage to be the unfaithful…

Underoath has a song I love and have never quite been able to shake entitled “Some Will Seek Forgiveness, Others Escape”.  And in it I’m ever humbled by these words: “Hey unfaithful I will teach you to be stronger, to be stronger.  Hey unloving, I will love you, I will love you, I will love you…”

I am grateful that even though I am unfaithful, God continues to be faithful (2 Timothy 2:13).  And that His grace is greater than my inadequacies.

I am the unfaithful.  But Lord, find me faithful…

“Teach me your way, Lord, that I may rely on your faithfulness; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.”  Psalm 86:11