Please Don't Make Me Publish This

I'm not so sure I'm going to publish this, but I am going to write it.  I need to.  I'm ashamed to put this into words, typed up for all the world to see.  (Even if no one actually does.  Just the remote possibility is enough to make me scared.)

Here's the truth.  I hate someone.  This person would be shocked, I think, to know the depth of my anger/hatred.

Here's the point at which my humanness wants to give you a list of reasons excuses, to mitigate what some potential someone might think.  Some might even seem "justifiable" excuses.  That's all they are, however.  Excuses.  That verse, the one that keeps biting me, the one that says, "Let all that you do be done in LOVE."  Yeah, that one.  It leaves no room for me to hate.

Let me tell you a bit about how this confession has come about.  I have been stewing over a situation for a while now.  I have prayed many times over this person, but always the wrong way, with the wrong motives.  Mostly, I have prayed to be able to avoid this person, to not have to deal with him/her (from here on out, I'm going to use the masculine to make it simple.)

Today, as I was praying AGAIN, it hit me.  I hate this person.  I didn't want to say it.  Hate is such a strong, awful word.  It's a strong, awful thing.

And it's sin.  Pure and simple.  It. Must. Be. Called. Out.  By name.  Because, if I don't call it out, I'll continue.  And I'll hide behind lesser things, like "he just makes me so mad!" or "he just rubs me the wrong way!" or "he and I just don't get along."  It's deeper than that, though.  He doesn't "make" me anything.  I choose to be angry, I choose to think ill of him.

It must end.  Today, I began the first step.  I called the sin by name, and asked God for forgiveness.  I prayed for the Lord to remove my hate for this person, to change my heart.  Specifically.  By name.  Do you know, I struggled with telling God that I hate this person.  I didn't want to say it.  To say it would make it seem real.  Sadly, though, it already was the reality in my heart.  I just had to come to the place where I finally saw it for what it was.

And it's ugly.  And dark.  And scary.

But you know what?  I almost immediately felt the anger subsiding, the hatred going away.  Being honest, and repentant, begins the process.  Asking God to change my heart is the correct prayer.  Because He deals with me when talking to me.  He doesn't want me to rant about someone else, but to ask Him to change me.  He's the only One who can break this heart of stone.  And I believe He will. It may take time.  I've been hateful toward this person for a long time now.

I'm thankful that God is not finished with me yet, or this person.  I am thankful that God is not finished with this circumstance, even.  He can bring beauty out of ashes.  If He can love a selfish, sinful, easily angered, "polished on the outside, rotten on the inside" sinner like me, then there's hope.  He can do anything.  Any. Thing.  He specializes in the impossible!