it washes me whiter than the snow..

Believing in something bigger than ourselves doesnt mean we are blind to whats broken in the world. Doesn't mean we deny them, ignore them, act like because we are called a certain position, pretend to be better, cleaner, whiter.
things are broken. people know pain, we know despair, despondency. sickness,death. we know guilt. we know ugliness. we have darknesses within ourselves we are afraid to face. we hang on each day. we know we fail. we know how it feels to disappoint people.. we know grief, sorrow.

if we tried to put ourselves in the hurts of our friends who face different ones of all these things ....
we may catch just a glimpse of the overwhelming pain, because we all in some ways have felt the same before. it is real. if we thought of all the things that are wrong with the world....
we may find ourselves feeling so heavy, unspeakable sorrow.

Believing in something bigger than ourselves.. just means that we believe in a Hope that saves. that for every brokenness that exists, for every time we end up at a seeming dead end with no escape,at the end of ourselves. . there is Hope. we are not finished. there is life to be resurrected still.
Jesus, when He was in the garden.. wasn't at peace. He wasn't glad, unaffected, in charge, victorious. He was heavy with sorrow, down at the pits, grieved by the pains of a world. .which was so so far astray from what God had in mind. what tragedy.

Isaiah 53

¹ Who believes what we've heard and seen? Who would have thought God's saving power would look like this?

^2-6The servant grew up before God—a scrawny seedling,
a scrubby plant in a parched field.
There was nothing attractive about him,
nothing to cause us to take a second look.
He was looked down on and passed over,
a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand.
One look at him and people turned away.
We looked down on him, thought he was scum.
But the fact is, it was our pains he carried—
our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us.
We thought he brought it on himself,
that God was punishing him for his own failures.
But it was our sins that did that to him,
that ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins!
He took the punishment, and that made us whole.
Through his bruises we get healed.
We're all like sheep who've wandered off and gotten lost.
We've all done our own thing, gone our own way.
And God has piled all our sins, everything we've done wrong,
on him, on him.

^7-9He was beaten, he was tortured,
but he didn't say a word.
Like a lamb taken to be slaughtered
and like a sheep being sheared,
he took it all in silence.
Justice miscarried, and he was led off—
and did anyone really know what was happening?
He died without a thought for his own welfare,
beaten bloody for the sins of my people.
They buried him with the wicked,
threw him in a grave with a rich man,
Even though he'd never hurt a soul
or said one word that wasn't true.

¹⁰Still, it's what God had in mind all along,
to crush him with pain.
The plan was that he give himself as an offering for sin
so that he'd see life come from it—life, life, and more life.
And God's plan will deeply prosper through him.

^11-12Out of that terrible travail of soul,
he'll see that it's worth it and be glad he did it.
Through what he experienced, my righteous one, my servant,
will make many "righteous ones,"
as he himself carries the burden of their sins.
Therefore I'll reward him extravagantly—
the best of everything, the highest honors—
Because he looked death in the face and didn't flinch,
because he embraced the company of the lowest.
He took on his own shoulders the sin of the many,
he took up the cause of all the black sheep.