What I Behold

That's it. That's it. 
All this time, all these months struggling with who I am and why I keep failing and why I'm so scared all the time and it only took a few words to make it click. 

"“If I am to be like Him, then God in his grace must do it, and the sooner I come to recognize it the sooner I will be delivered from another form of bondage. Throw down every endeavor and say, I cannot do it, the more I try the farther I get from his likeness. What shall I do? Ah, the Holy Spirit says, you cannot do it; just withdraw; come out of it. You have been in the arena, you have been endeavoring, you are a failure, come out and sit down, and as you sit there behold Him, look at Him. Don’t try to be like Him, just look at Him. Just be occupied with Him. Forget about trying to be like Him. Instead of letting that fill our mind and heart, let Him fill it. Just behold Him, look upon Him through the Word. Come to the Word for one purpose and that is to meet the Lord. Not to get your mind crammed full of things about the sacred Word, but come to it to meet the Lord. Make it to be a medium, not to Biblical scholarship, but of fellowship with Christ.”

I still struggle.  It’s so easy to forget.  This is a reminder to myself and to my own bored, distracted, divided heart.  Look up.  Stop looking at yourself and your life and your habits through Jesus-lens – and just look at glorious, radical King Jesus." 

(This is the beautiful Kate Conner quoting Norman Douty.)  

That's it. All the junk clogging up my head and the sirens drowning out His voice and the fear blinding me to His gifts and the answer is oh, so, simple. 
Stop trying so hard. Stop looking at how much you can study, how much you can be like Him and be good. 
Because you can't. 
I cannot be like Jesus. I cannot be good. I cannot be brave, and beautiful, and bold. 
But I can look at Jesus. I can dwell on who He is. His goodness. His bravery. His beauty. His boldness. And maybe, with a little time and a lot of grace, I can become what I behold.