The Call To Live Awake (Day 2)

Purity isn't a subject matter that I have allowed myself to be familiar with. In fact I have evaded it for the longest time.  I'd often react to the word and cringe at the memories of how many moments I've been the total opposite.  I still do to this day.  

I've been struggling with understanding chastity for most my life not because I don't want to be chaste or am not trying to be but because I don't see how else I can be chaste and how I can overcome the world's many distractions and temptations that can keep me from being chaste.  I have been pondering about this for a while and yesterday I finally took time to visit Jason and Crystalina Evert's page.  I've heard about them around 3 years ago but didn't really make the connection.  I suppose in my head I've already concluded that my struggle with chastity is an impossible battle and I've scarred my purity so deep with my lifestyle in the past that I will never just completely get it. 

As soon as I started to watch their videos and listen to their talks about chastity the wall just broke. And God's grace exposed the long time wound that hasn't been properly healed because I concluded it wasn't a big deal and buried it under the rug.  I buried my own thoughts about my dignity under a rug.  

What I learned about chastity does not only relate to promiscuity but it's how the lack of it keeps us from having a  deep reverence and love for our total beings.  I realized that our wanting to be chaste is deeply anchored to our belief that who we are is lovingly created by God.  That our identity is deeply rooted in Him.  When we choose not to be chaste, a part of knowing that identity is severed or will be incomplete.  When we choose not be chaste (in thoughts, deeds or acts) we hurt that part of ourselves that can willingly and easily respond to God's love.  

It's only by God's grace that I'm able to face these truths today.  I walked down memory  lane last night and asked Him to show me the areas in my life where I've kept my identity from Him.  There are too many and I grieve for those moments when I preferred to keep a distorted view of who I am because it was what was comfortable and acceptable.  It was what fit in.  

Today, I start living awake by reclaiming a new sense of purpose in understanding the gift  and virtue of chastity.  I start living awake by understanding how keeping this virtue leads me even deeper into discovering the love that is already present and the love that I can all the more have with Christ's love holding my heart.