Hello. I'm Amber, and I'm a perfectionist. (Hi, Amber!) I think when most people picture a perfectionist, they imagine a Type A personality who generally appears to have all her ducks in a row and/or to be in a tizzy if a duck gets out of line. I don't have a Type A personality, and I think some of my ducks may be lost under piles of laundry. In general, I tend to cope with my perfectionism by picking only a couple things to focus on at a time. "Sure, my house looks like a pack of hyenas came romping through here, but we made some progress today on Lily Beth's piano skills. I even managed to blog!" I tend to be more of a people-focused perfectionist. My environment may be pure chaos, but I'm focusing on the interactions and needs of the people around me. This means that a conflict with a loved one can rock me to the core.
So, of course, a few days after our Uganda team met to talk about spiritual warfare and conflict resolution, I got in a fight with my mom. The morning after our fight, I could see more clearly how spiritual warfare and letting my feelings win out over the truth I knew both played into the fight. We made peace, and I should have moved on. I did, sort of, but knowing that I made such hurtful mistakes ate into me. I started seeing more places that I was failing. As the list of failings grew so did my sense of confusion. I couldn't possibly take on all these failings at once, and I couldn't even figure out how to prioritize them and take on the "big ticket" items. I was a failure, and there was nothing I could do about it. Romans 7:15 was the verse I felt like described me best. "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do."
I knew that Romans 8 should have been a beacon of hope and freedom to me, but I just didn't feel free. I felt trapped and confused. I didn't feel like I was "more than conquerors," and although I believed that God wasn't condemning me, I felt my own condemnation weighing me down. I felt trapped in confusion.
Last night, I really felt that I needed to go dive into God's Word. (Answering my 4 year old's "Why is the Bible important?" question at bedtime might have helped prompt this.) My reading for the day was Philippians 3-4. I told God that I needed Him and for Him to speak to me through His Word, I grabbed my actual printed Bible that I've had since 9th grade (rather than my iPad), and I started reading. Even if I go in to a Bible reading desperate to meet with God, I'm still somehow surprised to see how "alive and active" His Word is, particularly when it's a passage that I know I've read and studied many times before.
Paul's first words in the passage are to rejoice in the Lord. I realized that I wasn't doing much (if any) of that lately, and I could understand what a difference that would make in my life immediately. Rejoice. Next, I ran up to Paul's history of perfectionism. As Saul, he was a pretty successful perfectionist! None of his ducks were lost under laundry piles. He even set out to make the world a more perfect place by his way of thinking. However, he didn't boast of his accomplishments. He didn't even say that his high-achieving ways were tarnished by the things he wasn't perfect at. He said that he considered his perfect pedigree and actions to be meaningless garbage.
I was confronted by a reality that I had been blind to over the last few days. Even if I could be "perfect" in my housekeeping, in my words, in my actions, in my relationships, that perfection would be as meaningful as refuse. "But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith." (Philippians 3:7-9) Perfection in all these Earth-y things would be futile, meaningless garbage.
Without even realizing yet that my newfound freedom could lead me into a new trap of perfectionism, I read the next few verses. "Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." I quickly realized that I could have easily turned knowing Christ into my new goal of perfection. Maybe, I couldn't be perfect at all this Earth-y stuff, but I could maybe try, like Paul, to focus on a perfect relationship with and knowledge of God. WRONG. Paul didn't trade in Jewish perfectionism for a self-earned Christian perfection. I mean, if someone could have achieved self-made Christian perfection, it would have been Paul, but that wasn't the point of this passage or the focus of his life. He gave up perfection to embrace Christ.
I'd been stumped regarding a new blog post for a while. I knew that I was struggling, and I knew that I shouldn't allow my struggles to make me want to disconnect from the Body in which He has surrounded me, but I felt like I needed to understand my struggles better before I shared and moved forward. Paul didn't seem to think that was necessary though. "FORGETTING WHAT IS BEHIND and straining toward what is ahead," I needed to press on toward God's calling on me.
God's Word freed me from a trap of confusing perfectionism. I'm sure I'll struggle with it again, but I'm so grateful that God reaches into my depths of confusion and despair to show me the light again and again. "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God." (Romans 8:26-27) Thank you, Spirit! I had no idea what I needed to even be asking for exactly. I was so confused. I'm awfully glad that you call us messes to you, God!
I'll continue with how God broke into my life further through Philippians 4 next time.
So, of course, a few days after our Uganda team met to talk about spiritual warfare and conflict resolution, I got in a fight with my mom. The morning after our fight, I could see more clearly how spiritual warfare and letting my feelings win out over the truth I knew both played into the fight. We made peace, and I should have moved on. I did, sort of, but knowing that I made such hurtful mistakes ate into me. I started seeing more places that I was failing. As the list of failings grew so did my sense of confusion. I couldn't possibly take on all these failings at once, and I couldn't even figure out how to prioritize them and take on the "big ticket" items. I was a failure, and there was nothing I could do about it. Romans 7:15 was the verse I felt like described me best. "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do."
I knew that Romans 8 should have been a beacon of hope and freedom to me, but I just didn't feel free. I felt trapped and confused. I didn't feel like I was "more than conquerors," and although I believed that God wasn't condemning me, I felt my own condemnation weighing me down. I felt trapped in confusion.
Last night, I really felt that I needed to go dive into God's Word. (Answering my 4 year old's "Why is the Bible important?" question at bedtime might have helped prompt this.) My reading for the day was Philippians 3-4. I told God that I needed Him and for Him to speak to me through His Word, I grabbed my actual printed Bible that I've had since 9th grade (rather than my iPad), and I started reading. Even if I go in to a Bible reading desperate to meet with God, I'm still somehow surprised to see how "alive and active" His Word is, particularly when it's a passage that I know I've read and studied many times before.
Paul's first words in the passage are to rejoice in the Lord. I realized that I wasn't doing much (if any) of that lately, and I could understand what a difference that would make in my life immediately. Rejoice. Next, I ran up to Paul's history of perfectionism. As Saul, he was a pretty successful perfectionist! None of his ducks were lost under laundry piles. He even set out to make the world a more perfect place by his way of thinking. However, he didn't boast of his accomplishments. He didn't even say that his high-achieving ways were tarnished by the things he wasn't perfect at. He said that he considered his perfect pedigree and actions to be meaningless garbage.
I was confronted by a reality that I had been blind to over the last few days. Even if I could be "perfect" in my housekeeping, in my words, in my actions, in my relationships, that perfection would be as meaningful as refuse. "But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith." (Philippians 3:7-9) Perfection in all these Earth-y things would be futile, meaningless garbage.
Without even realizing yet that my newfound freedom could lead me into a new trap of perfectionism, I read the next few verses. "Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." I quickly realized that I could have easily turned knowing Christ into my new goal of perfection. Maybe, I couldn't be perfect at all this Earth-y stuff, but I could maybe try, like Paul, to focus on a perfect relationship with and knowledge of God. WRONG. Paul didn't trade in Jewish perfectionism for a self-earned Christian perfection. I mean, if someone could have achieved self-made Christian perfection, it would have been Paul, but that wasn't the point of this passage or the focus of his life. He gave up perfection to embrace Christ.
I'd been stumped regarding a new blog post for a while. I knew that I was struggling, and I knew that I shouldn't allow my struggles to make me want to disconnect from the Body in which He has surrounded me, but I felt like I needed to understand my struggles better before I shared and moved forward. Paul didn't seem to think that was necessary though. "FORGETTING WHAT IS BEHIND and straining toward what is ahead," I needed to press on toward God's calling on me.
God's Word freed me from a trap of confusing perfectionism. I'm sure I'll struggle with it again, but I'm so grateful that God reaches into my depths of confusion and despair to show me the light again and again. "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God." (Romans 8:26-27) Thank you, Spirit! I had no idea what I needed to even be asking for exactly. I was so confused. I'm awfully glad that you call us messes to you, God!
I'll continue with how God broke into my life further through Philippians 4 next time.
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