{"id":20742,"date":"2021-11-18T11:34:28","date_gmt":"2021-11-18T16:34:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=20742"},"modified":"2021-11-18T11:40:55","modified_gmt":"2021-11-18T16:40:55","slug":"20742","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=20742","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PQdZt-77KT8\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Seeing Ourselves as God Sees Us<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><em>In this conversation, CAC teacher and therapist James Finley shares his belief that we can only be freed from our addictions by healing our original wound\u2014a loss of connection with divine love. Jim speaks here about the healing nature of seeing ourselves as God sees us.&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We can say that the deepest question of my life, really, is not what my father . . . or my mother thought of me, or what my husband or wife thinks of me, or what my pastor or my boss thinks of me. Really, the deepest issue isn\u2019t what I think of me, but&nbsp;<em>can I join God in knowing who God knows me to be?&nbsp;<\/em>Can I join God in seeing who God sees me to be when God sees me? This is salvation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In order to do this, I have to let go of my own present way of seeing things, and I discover I can\u2019t. We\u2019re afraid to lose the control that we think that we have over the life that we think that we\u2019re living, and we\u2019re addicted to what blinds us. . . . The mystery of the cross, then, is this mystery of just being liberated from this deep addiction to the illusion of an ultimately isolated self that has to make it on its own. To realize I\u2019m in the presence of the love that loves us and takes us to itself. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Jim envisions God saying to each of us, in the midst of our struggles: &nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know what? . . . &nbsp;I\u2019m in love with you. I\u2019m so in love with you that I\u2019m utterly giving myself away [to you] as invincibly precious in my eyes, in the midst of the unresolved matters of your heart. I find in these unresolved matters no obstacle to how infinitely precious you are to me as I pour out and give myself to you as life of my life. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Jim concludes:&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s faith in the higher power. But what if the brokenness has no authority at all over us? What if only love has the authority over us? That\u2019s the essence of the gospel. The essence of the gospel is there. That\u2019s why I say the miracle stories of Jesus, when you really look at the healing stories, they\u2019re all the same, basically. A person brings suffering; Jesus listens to the suffering, responds to the suffering. But Jesus sees the essence of their suffering isn\u2019t that their daughter died or they can\u2019t see or they can\u2019t walk, or they\u2019re a prostitute or a tax collector. The issue of their suffering is they think\u00a0<em>they<\/em>\u00a0<em>are<\/em>\u00a0what\u2019s wrong with them. It\u2019s the idolatry of their shame. Reflected in [Jesus\u2019] eyes, they see their true face before they were born, hidden with Christ in God forever. That\u2019s experiential salvation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"330\" src=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/image-4-500x330.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-20745\" srcset=\"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/image-4-500x330.png 500w, https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/image-4-300x198.png 300w, https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/image-4-768x507.png 768w, https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/image-4.png 1874w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><br><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Seeing Ourselves as God Sees Us In this conversation, CAC teacher and therapist James Finley shares his belief that we can only be freed from our addictions by healing our original wound\u2014a loss of connection with divine love. Jim speaks here about the healing nature of seeing ourselves as God sees us.&nbsp; We can say [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20742"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20742"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20742\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20748,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20742\/revisions\/20748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}