Qualify

Qualify is another one of those trigger words for perfectionists like me. It sounds like there is a test to pass, there is some standard that I have to meet and I immediately feel stress.

So I wasn't particularly please to see that word in the new young women's theme where it says “as I strive to qualify for exaltation.”

I know that my eternal well-being is my choice. I was given agency and God will not force me to heaven. But what exactly do I have to choose? What is my part? The word qualify feels like it is all being placed on me. I have to be perfect to get to heaven, to be loved, to feel okay about myself. The triggers are all there.

I always find myself going back to John 3:16-17

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that who so ever believe with on him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.

That’s is God’s part. John then goes on to talk about our part

John 3:18 – 21

• He that believes is not condemned
• He that doesn’t believe is condemned because he loves darkness
• He that doeth truth loves the light 

So it is clear we make choice a choice to love light and truth or darkness. If we love light we are doing what we can - we believe and are following Jesus. We are aware of our mistakes and changing constantly because we love Him and what to be with Him.

That is it! That is all we have to do. Now the whole thing goes back to him!

Verse 3 of "Away in a Manger" says:

Be near me, Lord Jesus

I asked thee to stay

Close by me forever

And love me I pray.

Bless all the dear children

In thy tender care

And fit us for heaven

To live with thee there.

That says to me "My desire is here.  I have asked Him to be near me.  Now the Lord can bless and sanctify me and "fit me for heaven".

Perhaps we can also consider the word qualify maybe substituted with the word prepared. (I make this same suggestion when talking about the word "worthy".)  "As I strive to prepare myself for exaltation" feels better to me. There are things I can do to prepare myself - it doesn't feel like I am being judged. It's really important for me to define words like this in ways that feel good to me.

I do have a bottom line of how I expect a gospel truth to be taught. My bottom line is that our ability to respond to truth is most likely to happen when it is spoken with love.  Some words convey love to me better than others.

As I see it, heaven is not a reward for merit. It is an "eternal sociality of celestial beings, existing, striving and creatively, engaging in loving relationships. Atonement is primarily about healing the pains and strains of injured relationships incurred in route to that destination, fractures among ourselves as humans and with those Gentle Parents patiently working to improve and guide us." (Givens, The Christ Who Heals, page 74)

This feels so right to me. I qualify when I accept the Lord’s invitation to come and be healed. I have to be humble and willing to do that. I have to swallow my pride. I have to be willing to forgive. I have to accept His way of life and I do that when I feel His love and am drawn to him.

1 John 4:19 We love him because he first loved us.

"And he who created me for love, by the same love wanted to restore man to the same blessedness and even more… Our creator wished us to be like Jesus Christ, Our Savior in heaven forever… And God revealed this all most blessedly, as though to say, See, I am God. See, I do all things. See, I never remove my hands from my work, nor ever shall without end. See, I guide all things to the end that I ordained them for, before time began, with the same power and wisdom and love with which I made them, how should anything be amiss? (Julian of Norwich)

That is the love that invites and beckons and to which I respond, "Lord, I would follow Thee"!

That response qualifies me!

That response qualifies me!