A Ramble about Guilt and Torment

     Over the last several days, I've been having to work through some stuff. I went out on Friday morning to start working at the barn again, and I just began to feel like I had been hit by a truck. I would have thought I was physically sick, except I wasn't. I hadn't really been feeling 100% emotionally right a couple of days prior, since my last chiropractor adjustment on Wednesday, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it and it just really came to a head on Friday morning as I had to stop what I was doing and return to the house. I spent the next three hours feeling like crap in bed, and those hours afterwards not much better.
    This is going to sound really strange, but I had gotten from the Lord that I was supposed to watch the final season of Lucifer just after my Chiropractic adjustment. It wasn't my first choice of shows. I'd never really watched it before except for the occasional clip on Youtube because of its main premise and protagonist. But, I went ahead and ordered it, and it arrived on Friday just after I had needed to head back into the house. I didn't know why I needed to watch it, but I've found that there is always a reason for things like this, and it eventually makes sense once I've obeyed. So, I started watching Friday night, and finished it on Saturday (it was only ten episodes).
    By the second or third episode in, I was beginning to understand. In it, there was a lot of talk about a person being caught in a "hell loop" because of unresolved guilt which they hadn't dealt with or hadn't let go of. This played out with several of the characters. And for me, this was part of the message I needed to see and hear. I have done things in my past which I am not particularly proud of. But more than this, I tended to take responsibility for things happening which, if I was to be honest, were out of my control. And there was something which happened a very long time ago, which I do not wish to elaborate on, which hurt people I loved and for which I blamed myself. I was not the cause of their pain, but in the chain of events, it was my idea which led to the circumstances of it. And I had never forgiven myself for it, just like I hadn't forgiven myself for a host of other things which my ideas, words, or actions had led to.
    Here's the thing, at the time, I was trying to do what I thought to be the right thing as far as I knew. I think, for most of my life, that is what I have tried to do. Most people do. I know of very few people who intentionally try to do the wrong thing, and just about everyone has a justification for why they act the way they do, believing themselves to be right at the time even when the results end up hurting others and themselves. This is the very nature of hamartia, trying to do the right thing and ending up doing the wrong.
And this accumulation of subconscious guilt was physically hurting me, tormenting me, and keeping me from functioning. It wasn't God who wasn't forgiving me, it was me as though I was somehow more "righteous" than God by holding onto all of my own mistakes and erroneous behaviors.
    By the end of the series I watched, the main protagonist realizes his true calling is helping others to work through their guilt and problems so that they too can find redemption. But in order to be that person, he has to do something which he swore he'd never do because if he doesn't, he won't become the person he's supposed to be. And this was the second thing the Lord wanted to get across to me. I myself wouldn't be who I am now without having made those mistakes, and gone through what I have. I look back at my own existence, and there are many, many things I would go back and make different decisions if I could. But, if I were capable of doing that, I would no longer be this person. Who I am now would be destroyed, and those people who have benefited from who I am now would also no longer be who they are, and so on, and so on. It would be cataclysmic for not only myself, but those I love and those I don't even know. And I would only be doing it to selfishly keep myself from the pain of the guilt I now hold.
    So, after I watched the last episode of Lucifer, ironically feeling the Lord's presence next to me saying, "This is what I've been trying to tell you." I went for a walk on the property here. And as I sat down next to the edge of the lake in the back, I began to sob and let the guilt I had been holding onto out.
The thing I am learning is that, it's not really God's forgiveness that is most important. If we turn around from what we're doing, He's only too happy to forgive and set us on the right path. But the far more damning thing is our own guilt and unforgiveness of ourselves. It is our own guilt and unforgiveness of our past selves which keeps us bound and in chains. It is our own guilt and unforgiveness of ourselves which makes us feel that we aren't worthy, and causes us to feel like He's won't forgive us. Because if I wouldn't forgive myself, why would He forgive me? At least this is the logic used. And if we feel that He wouldn't forgive, we don't believe He would no matter how much blood is spilled in sacrifice or how much we might try to do to make restitution, even if He has already said He will.
    I'm doing better today, but I know I've still got a ways to go as well in terms of letting go. Subconsciously, our worst and most damning judge can be ourselves.