The Greatest Crown (Part 1)

I'm skipping the week in review for today, not because nothing of note happened, but because there's a lot of other stuff I need to talk about. Although I do want to quickly mention that I'm going to Davis on Thursday to meet up and talk with folks. And that I just heard that Aaron is in California! I hope I can meet up with him. I'm so overjoyed to hear I might get to see him!

Today I was listening to K-Wave (107.9 in Southern California) and I heard the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association's weekly broadcast, and I heard this story:




When I heard the part where she said she was going to take one last shot at the crown and the missionary lady said, "let me tell you about the greatest crown", this was the face I made and how I felt (watch closely at 22 seconds):

Bold!!! Cold blooded! Bam!! Slam Dunk!! I want to give them a big hug. That was so cool. The youth pastor couple, too. So cool. I really want to give high fives all around!

I just love this story. It always amazes me how Jesus can heal all of a person's insecurities and pains. Aaron once told us that before he became a believer he knew he had pains and issues so deep that he knew no human being could ever heal him from them. I find the same thing in my life. There were deeply rooted issues that were so fantastically deep and complicated, that I never thought I would be rid of. I even joked with a friend and we would say, "deeply rooted".

That part about the beached whale struck me hard. A few months ago I was stopped at the front of a light at Colima & Whittier in Whittier. A girl in her late teens crossed the intersection and walked in front of my car. She was wearing her Togo's uniform and was headed to the Togo's across the street. I recognized her because the day before I had gone to Togo's for some reason. (I had never even been to Togo's before. I can't remember what moved me to go there, but obviously now I know.) Some guys in the vehicle to my left honked at her and started laughing her and mocking her appearance because they found her very unattractive. I started to burn with anger at those guys. "How could they do that to her?!?!?! Don't they know how much they're hurting her??" I saw how she was first shocked by the horn and then how she cringed and looked away when she realized what they were doing. You could see the pain in her eyes. Her face changed and she looked like she was ready to burst into tears. That look on her face struck me like a bolt of lightning. It's still burned into my mind.

That night when I was lying on my bed to go to sleep I started thinking about her. What was she thinking? How was she feeling? How did that touch her? How is she coping? I thought about similar pains I had when I was young. I started to cry for her. I begged God to let me talk to her. I could feel her pain so clearly. I made up my mind that I was going to talk to her the next day.

I wanted to tell her how I cried about her and how if I can cry for her and care about her how much more God cares and cries about her. And he does, I know he was heartbroken as well. I wanted to tell her how wrong and mean those guys were and how God sees her so much differently, how precious she is to him and how much he gave to save her. I wanted to tell her about the deep infinite love God has for her and also how I experienced his shocking love and healing in my life, how he healed my self esteem that could never be healed by the world.

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