The desire for acceptance can never be satisfied through the strivings of our own efforts to be acceptable.
It can only be satisfied through an acceptance not based on our strivings, but on the basis of an accepting love that falls on us in spite of who we are.
From Searching For Grace:
The acceptance we long for is not self-acceptance, or even others-acceptance; it’s divine acceptance – a welcome and delight freely given given to us by the one who created us. Only God’s grace can dispel the darkness in my soul. It’s frightening, really; the way light shines into my darkness is through the cracks of my broken self. But if I’m willing to take that risk, I can be welcomed and exist in the holy beam as God’s forever beloved.
Searching For Grace, Scotty Smith and Russ Masterson, Tyndale, 2021, pg 39.
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