Last of all, as to someone untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace towards me has not been in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them—though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we proclaim and so you have come to believe. (1Corinthians 15: 8-11)

Paul was a man. A tent maker. A husband. (A father?) A serious student of scripture. A man capable of purposeful violence. A creative and persuasive communicator. Much more.

He was deeply flawed, as are each of us. He was paradoxical, which seems to me innate to the human condition. He was both unfit and profoundly able.

But Paul - much more than I - worked hard to resolve the paradox. He did so, in part, by accepting his flaws and failures. He does not hide them.

"I am what I am," he writes. I perceive Paul knew himself much more deeply than most. This self-knowledge was an important source of his deeper understanding of God.

I am unfit. I am a child of God. I cause confusion and error. I am a source of clarity and direction. I am flawed and sinful. God loves me.