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The children bickered all day. Each time I settled an
argument the muscles in my neck twitched and the rock in the
pit of my stomach grew heavier. As a home schooling mom, I
have plenty of opportunity to see their struggles. That day
one of the children exploded as I taught spelling, another
argued with me over a reading lesson, and everyone seemed to
forget their chores. By bedtime my shoulders slumped. I
forced myself through the nightly routine, praying prayers I
didn't feel.
When the house finally quieted I wrote in my journal, then
turned out the light and put on my favorite CD. I lay on the
couch, huddled under an afghan, defeated. I mourned my sins
of omission, listening to a singer who knew failure.
"After all," I told myself, "if I were a good mother, my
children wouldn't talk back, bicker, or be angry." Good
mothers had better discipline. Good mothers had more
patience. Good mothers had done a better job in the early
years and their post-preschool children would always be
obedient and kind--And of course a good mother could go to
bed with a clean kitchen because the children had done their
chores without being reminded!
As I lay in the dark I asked God to reveal His truth. It
came a few days later as I sat in my blue recliner, writing
a prayer in my journal. I was doing it again! Taking guilt
that wasn't mine. Blaming myself when Christ had declared me
blameless . . . and what made it worse is I took my
children's sins upon myself as well.
The Lord showed me I had to release my children to Him. To
let them be human. Like me, they weren't perfect. Like me,
they needed to own their sin and let Him forgive. How could
they learn to follow their Lord if I stayed in the way,
confusing them by blaming myself for their mistakes?
My children didn't need a savior. They already had one. My
children also didn't need a perfect mother, one who knew how
to settle every argument, discipline away every stray word,
and tame every rebellion. They had a Lord for that. They
needed to confront their need for the Holy Spirit's
moment-by-moment intervention and empowerment.
I'm beginning to see how closely perfectionism and guilt are
tied together. If the enemy can make me think I should be
perfect he can quickly defeat me . . . and I'm back in that
same old ugly cycle of guilt and failure.
Perfectionism rears its ugly head too often in my life. It
sets unreachable standards for myself and causes me to take
on other people's faults.
As a young woman I worked very hard to be good. I wanted to
please God and yet I felt I never lived up. A few years ago
I studied the book of Ephesians. When I began chapter four,
I became angry. "Be completely humble and gentle; be
patient, bearing with one another in love." (Ephesians 4:2
NIV) "God!" I cried out in desperation, "I can't be
completely patient and gentle for one hour! How can you
expect this of me?"
As I sat quietly before Him, I was reminded of the first
three chapters of Ephesians. They showed me that I was the
dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, raised up with Christ,
and seated in the heavenly places. In chapter 2, I'd read,
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and
this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God?not by works,
so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus . . ." (Ephesians 2:8-10b NIV)
I began to understand that anything good in me was a result
of God's loving work, not my own effort. Finally, my eyes
fell upon the end of Chapter 3, where Paul prays that the
people of Ephesus would grasp how wide, long, high, and deep
Christ's love is so that they could be filled to the
fullness of God. (See Ephesians 3:16-19) Wasn't that my
desire--to be like God, filled up with Him so I could be
patient and good? Wasn't the scripture saying that the way
to do that was to discover the depth of Christ's love for
me? In that moment I felt a whisper in my heart. "Paula," my
Lord said, "all your life you've tried to be good. Get to
know me and I will make you good."
The Lord is teaching me to let go of perfectionism. Showing
me that the secret to the Christian life is a relationship
with Him. Anytime I focus on my behavior and working harder,
I've lost the battle. My focus should be on Christ and what
He did at the cross. This journey is not about me. Christ is
the One who is perfect. He's the author and perfecter of my
life. (See Hebrews 12:2) He's the One who takes all my
mistakes, sins, inadequacies, and failures and changes them
into something beautiful. He's the One that replaced my old,
messy human heart with His own perfect one. My job is to
keep my eyes on Him.
I forgot this as I let guilt consume me with my children
that day. After all, I have no greater desire than to see
them walk a godly life, fully devoted to God's plan for
them. In my zeal to create the perfect home, the perfect
life, the perfect KIDS, I returned to the enemy's lies.
Praise God! The pressure is off. I can get out of the way
and let the Holy Spirit bring conviction, love, and change
in my children. I can remember that they, too, have sinful
flesh which battles against the Spirit within. I can quit
taking their faults upon myself and let God make us all
vessels that will glorify Him.
Good-bye guilt. Good-bye perfectionism. Hello, Jesus!
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