8:00 a.m.

I picked up my purple headphones and propped them on my head like a padded, electric crown.

I sat on the stage behind a clear screen that made me feel like a fish in an aquarium.
Except that I could breathe…
somewhat.

My hands (and feet) were too busy to mess with the sound levels in my ears that were throwing me off.

I had barely eaten any breakfast, though I slept in more than normal because of a recent itinerary change. Of course, that meant there was less time to rehearse our set.

My heart beat quickly. Too quickly.
Time went slowly, too slowly, until it was time to begin.

I forgot the rhythm to the first song. Struggled to retrieve it from my memory.

Second song seemed like a recovery: I loved the ambient tones of this song that set a worshipful (and calm!) mood.
Until the middle of the song,
when our suddenly our track crashed.
The ambience was gone.

Attempting to fill in the obvious silence, it felt like the Mean Girls’ “Jingle Bell Rock” scene:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=h81UOjlFmMs%3Fstart%3D56%26end%3D67

 

***

Anytime anything bad happens, and even 5% of it is my fault,
I get this icky pit in my stomach.

It’s amazing
the lengths I’ll go
to make that go
away.

***

“There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,”
he recounted into the microphone.

I considered what that meant for the man who wrote those words. Paul, a man who hated people because they believed differently from him — a man who was responsible for the deaths of many such people. He would then be commanded by God to face these people… and join them. To go up to the nieces and nephews of the man he executed with his political power… and say,

“Your God,
I despised him,
but He appeared to me…
He saved me…

I wanted to kill myself but…
Your God commanded me
to use my life for His cause.
And I owe Him that life now.

I beg you. Forgive me…
Not for my sake…
there is work to do. “

My pastor continued: “I love Eugene Peterson’s translation in the message, which reads,
‘Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us
no longer have to live under a continuous,
low-lying
black
cloud.'”

I wondered what this meant for Paul.

I wondered what this meant for the man standing in front of me.

***

I looked up to picture the black clouds above my own head,
and failed to identify them. To label them. To name them.

What sin hangs over my head? I feel the black cloud daily… but what is it?

Lust? No, I’ve actually been doing well in that department (at least the past few weeks).
Addictions? Nothing serious. Facebook maybe? What a wimpy addiction to have, I thought.
Some huge thing in my past? No… I’ve already given those to God and found freedom and forgiveness. Truly. I am not my sins, I am not my temptations, I am not my own.

My pastor wants us to be free. He loves every human being who was in that room that day. I know because I’ve seen it. Because he loves us, he brought a cross up to the front of the room, asked us to write our black clouds on a piece of paper and nail them to the cross.

What was mine?

I thought of that icky pit in my stomach. Was it gone?
Nope. Still there…

I used to rely on that pit in my stomach to make me a better person.

But last year, God showed me something (again, by speaking to me from backstage after messing up drumming):

If I’m to operate like my true self, who was designed for a society void of sin and guilt, that I would need something stronger to guide me.

Not a guilt that drags me along, fatigued and lonely and, quite frankly, nauseous —
But the Holy Spirit: the one who gives and recalls life as He pleases,
in a way that reveals the reality of things, of our condition, of our need, of the significant weight that comes with having free will.

Dead to sin. Alive to Christ…

***

Two more songs.

I swear, guys. I always try my very best not to look at people from onstage when my pastor asks everyone to close their eyes and look up if they’re surrendering to Jesus.

I succeeded this time… But as I was drumming, people were coming up to nail their sins to the cross, I subconsciously glanced over and saw a man in business attire.

I caught him at just the right moment: jabbing a bulletin pin into the cross. He was angry.  I almost felt ashamed for glancing, this moment was so intimate between this man and Jesus. Because whatever this cloud of guilt was… he was done with it. He crucified the sin with which he was resolutely finished — as finished as Christ’s atonement for that sin on on that ancient, blood-soaked cross.

God’s wrath for this man had been exhausted.

It’s not that God was never wrathful. He despises sin. I don’t think the American church teaches that very often, but it’s orthodox, and it’s the only thing that is consistent with God’s actions in the Scriptures.

Without Jesus, we deserve God’s wrath. As a holy God, He cannot be around even an ounce of sin, whether adultery or rape or even lust in our minds. But just as soon as the perfect judge — who would be a fraud to brush sin under the rug —threw down the gavel with tears in His eyes, He sent His son to pay the bail, so this businessman would be a free man.

Finally free.

Wrath? There was none left for him. The anger this man felt toward himself — Jesus told him that day, “Don’t pin this on you. Pin this on me. I’ll take that. I love you.”

***

Guys, we do this silly thing.

We try to pay bail with perpetual guilty feelings. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think that’s an acceptable form of payment. Not to state government. Not to a divine being. And certainly not to a divine being who already paid our bail with blood, sweat, and tears. What a disgrace to tell Him, “Your work was not enough. Here. Let me add to it with some guilty feelings.”

We do this silly thing. We try to make up for our disobedience with perpetually insufficient resolutions — when our guilt was already paid with a life.

But true repentance is not, “Sorry God. I’ll try harder.”

That is not called repentance.
That is called “practical atheism.”
That is called “failure on repeat.”
And I’d even go as far as saying, that’s called “self-idolatry.”

Because although you talk to God, when it comes down to choosing between
His divine strength
and your human strength
to overcome your human issues…
you go with your own.

You are,
for all practical purposes,
believing that your power is stronger than God’s.
No wonder your sin has you pinned down.

This is not repentance.

True repentance looks more like this:

“God, I have utterly failed you in every way.
It is impossible for me to ever do what is right.
I always fall short.
And I will continue to do so.
Only you can save me from this body of death!

Right now, despite my feelings,
I choose to I believe that You can…
and I don’t know how…
but I believe not only that you can…
but also that you will.

And instead of making these changes myself,
I will wait on You to transform me.
I’ll be on the lookout.
Thank you that you are faithful,
even and especially when I am not.
Your faithfulness is big enough for the both of us,
and that is the only thing that gives me hope.”

Dead to sin. Alive to Christ. The same Christ accomplished these both with the same power. A power with which none of our self-help methods can compare. A power which our “you just do you” mantras scoff at as a fraud — just like everything else they’ve tried and failed. A power far stronger than human strength, to hold you up under whatever temptations will inevitably come to revive your sins perhaps daily.

***

I averted my eyes back to my ride cymbal, watched my hands move, only partially on my own command. (Drumming is the art of pushing learned patterns into your subconscious so your brain can handle all four of your limbs with attention to spare.)

I am in Christ, I thought with my remaining brain attention. There is no condemnation for me.

… what does that mean for me?

I thought of everything that had gone wrong that morning. The overwhelming guilt and inadequacy I felt even just from a few hours of trying my absolute best!

The sound levels were still off…
The purple, electric crown on my head
seemed to blast my mistakes at me
and I felt far from royal.
I strained to hear God’s voice amidst the noise of the church service.

“I’ve got your back. And I will advocate for you.”

It was not audible. It was a feeling. Like the music.
A feeling I knew was backed by the Scriptures:

“My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin.

But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father — Jesus Christ, the Righteous One.

He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.”

// The Apostle John,
eyewitness of Jesus’ earthly life,
recorded in 1 John 2:1-2 (emphasis mine)

God is the only judge who can judge with perfect integrity and still advocate for the one who is in the wrong. Jesus was not just a talented lawyer, covering up the sins of his defendant. He was a talented acquitter — washing off our bloodguilt like a firehose to a chalkboard — until the guilt was no longer ours.

Without a trace.

***

The song ended — too quickly, because I started the song too early, and the track started about a minute into the song on top of that.

I went out to greet people, first with my head down, then with my head up. This is not about you. This is not about your performance just now. This is about people feeling loved. Focus on them.

And yet, as I greeted people, something weird happened.

“You sounded great!”
“You did such a great job!”
“I didn’t know you played the drums! It was so cool to see you up there!”

Even our sound crew: “That went well!”

What the heck just happened? Are you deaf? Did you not hear what just happened in there?

Without a trace.

This is the best illustration I could think of tonight for what it means to have our sins covered by the cross.

When Jesus died for us, Scriptures say that He “covered our sins” (Psalm 85:2).
This doesn’t mean He hides them before the judge.
This doesn’t mean that parts of us must remain hidden!
This doesn’t mean that we ignore the fact that, even as people made alive to Christ, our sinful nature never went anywhere!

It means,
He’s got you covered.
And that He will be your advocate,
even when you are in the wrong.

And after you have a horrible gig,
you will find that
the whole time
He was covering your every note,
so that those who heard your life
heard a song
far more glorious
than you ever anticipated.

So stop focusing on yourself and your shortcomings,
and start focusing on
the power
of your God
to use things
like Paul and my pastor and you and me,
things formerly deserving wrath,
to bring about a true community,
centered not on sin or sadness or power struggle,
but on righteousness —
until we are finally no longer alone.

Without a trace.

As you look back on your life, you will not see a life about which God despairs. You will see a life in which God delights. A road whose cracks are filled in by a substance that looks a lot like Jesus.

And you will leave eternity in your wake.

 

 

“Blessed are those
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the one
whose sin the Lord will never count against them.”
// Romans 4:7-8