We are Worthy

In Tattoos on the Heart, Gregory Boyle writes:

       Mother Teresa told a roomful of lepers once how loved by God
       they were and a “gift to the rest of  us.”  Interrupting her, an old
       leper raised his hand, and she calls on him. “Could you repeat that
       again?  It did me good. So, would you mind… just saying it again.”

       Franciscan Richard Rohr writes that “the Lord comes to us
       disguised as ourselves.”

       We’ve come to believe that we grow into this. The only thing we
       know about Jesus “growing up” is that he “grew in age, wisdom
       and favor with God.” But do we really grow in favor with God?
       Did Jesus become increasingly more favorable to God, or did he
       just discover, over time, that he was wholly favorable?


Did Jesus just discover over time that he was wholly favorable? I think so.  I think Jesus was always wholly favorable and growing in favor was merely his own growing in recognition of this. Additionally, if God comes to us disguised as ourselves, this means that we are all wholly favorable, just as we are, from the day we are born until the day we die.

When I really think about it, this has to be true. Otherwise there would be a way to determine when you had reached the point of true worthiness. What would that look like? I will be worthy when I get the right job? Or when my parents or my spouse is happy with me? I will be enough when I graduate from school or I publish my first book? What’s the test? When do we get there? Or worse yet, there is the idea of assuming my own unworthiness based on the bad things happening in my life: I must deserve this illness or it wouldn’t be happening to me; this tragedy must be some sort of karma; if I were good enough, my parents wouldn’t be divorcing or my loved one wouldn’t be dying.

It seems to me that there isn’t a way to determine the point in our lives when we miraculously and finally reach the place of being enough, of being worthy… worthy of love, belonging, peace, joy, dignity. So, we either always are, have been, and will be worthy, or we aren’t and never will be. Somehow, with every fiber of my being, I just know it’s the first: each of us, with all of our imperfections, is born and remains wholly favorable, wholly worthy, no matter what.

I know this and yet, it’s so difficult for me to feel it sometimes. I am an expert at not feeling good enough, as if I have to do more so that people will like me, accept me, love me. I have to be more than me, to be enough for others.  Even today, I don’t have all of the answers on how to combat this. The almost unconscious idea that I must do something to grow in favor with God and others is so ingrained in me, that I struggle against it, despite intellectually knowing it’s not true.

I do know that sometimes, like the leper, I hold on to those moments from others when the sun shines through and I remember “I am loved. I am a gift” and I too say, “could you repeat that again? It did me good”.

What I am also realizing is that sometimes these moments from others come less than I need or want. What I am working on is saying those things to myself. Countless times over just this past week I have caught myself amidst a frenzy of one sort or another, I have stopped, taken a deep breath and said, “I am worthy”. I am beginning to stop the voices inside of me that say: do more, be more, be kinder, work harder, don’t be stupid. I am beginning to replace them with: You are enough, you are worthy, trust yourself, be kind to yourself.

I am at the beginning of my journey of discovering that I am wholly favorable: that there is nothing I can do to make God love me more or less. Since I have just begun, I can’t really say much about what affect it has had on me, although I am confident it will be pretty huge, but I do want to invite you to take the journey with me. I want to invite you too to remember that you are incredibly loved, incredibly worthy, incredibly whole, and incredibly enough, just as you are on this day, and every day of your life.

Together I hope and pray that we will grow in the knowledge that we have eternally been wholly favorable in God’s eyes. May we be reminders to others and to ourselves that we are worthy, that we are gifted and loved unconditionally. May we each lay down our shame and walk into life, gratitude, and joy.