Picture this, kid mid melt-down over your, "no", when he wanted a "yes". Dinner burning on the stove, phone ringing, emails calling, your other child yelling from 3 rooms away something about a tv show, and your "I've had it up to here" button about ready to explode. And all you can think in this moment is, "if I can't handle this, if I can't keep my cool, teach my kids to handle their emotions and get dinner ready on time, how in the world will I handle the bigger stuff? The real hard days, when a pandemic hits and I have to homeschool. When the kids are both sick and need me. When we add another sibling into the mix. Or when the hard diagnosis comes."
If you are anything like me, you have probably thought this more than once this past week. At face value this seems like a typical overwhelmed mama thought. But upon a deeper look, I begin to see a lie that I have been given and chosen to believe. A lie that says my worth and abilities are based on my positive or negative reactions to the difficult thing’s life throws my way.
When I buy into this lie, I become inundated with the pressure to perform, perfect and prove that I can hack it on any given day. And when I inevitably fall short, my already weary soul screams thoughts of failure and not good enough.
When I base my abilities off my best or worst days, I am allowing myself to be intimidated by Satan and his manipulation about my character. Satan is so good at twisting truth. Even Gods truth. The truth Satan doesn't want us to see, when he shouts, "I told you so!", is that we are not defined by our faults, failures, or our successful parenting moments. Instead we are defined by how we are forgiven.
It is true that in my own strength and abilities I won't ever amount to anything, but this is only half the story. When I stand confident in God's power, his store house of resources, grace and mercy, not my own abilities, I know that my weakness will be made into strength by his Holy Spirit alone. In him I can be more than a conqueror. Victorious over any situation that I face.
The full story is, that while our abilities won't get us anywhere on our own, we will fail, fall and disappoint the people around us, God can and will provide us with the tools we need to get through the day. The spilled milk, ER visits, late nights and marriage struggles.
In these moments of struggle, we need to look, not at the record of rights and wrongs or the good and bad score cards Satan waves in our face, rather we need to fix our gaze on the only one in whom our success lies, Jesus.
When we are struggling, or even have failed, God doesn't go over to our good and bad jar, check the levels of the shiny marbles inside and decide if we have enough in the good to deserve his grace and help in our time of need. He just looks at the work of his Son on the cross, his blood covering us, and he unleashes his mercy on us that enables us to weather the storm.
If we continue to look to our worst day's as a baseline for how we will succeed in the future, we are guaranteed to live discouraged lives. But if we fix our perspective onto God, and what he gifts us every day through the Holy Spirits work in our lives, we will begin to find peace, joy and the courage to dive deep into the unknown. Confident the arms of Jesus will be waiting to catch us every time.
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. Phil. 4:13
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