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We are all in the business of telling a story with our lives. Sometimes emotional storm clouds gather around us and threaten to destroy the goodness of the story we are trying to live out.
As we get older, sometimes we let voices other than God’s begin to narrate our lives. My own life and children have never been flawless.
For many years I allowed critical voices from family and friends dictate how I viewed myself and my story.
"You have made so many mistakes in your past, you can never make up for it."
"Why do you always think of the craziest things to believe and then follow these crazy ideals? You are going to fail and your children will be injured by your lack of wisdom."
"You fail so often. What right have you to speak or write? If people really knew how flawed and selfish you are at times, they would never want to listen to what you have to say."
"You are not doing enough as a mom and your children are never going to love God or be educated well, because you never accomplish all that you set out to do."
We all have voices in our heads that speak of flaws, fears, guilt, anger--and these thoughts can sometimes take over and bring darkness to our souls.
Culture became a significant voice in my life constantly making me feel ostracized and uncertain of my countercultural decisions. Often our critics are our own family members and "believers" in our own arenas. I call them Job's friends--ready to blame for the things that are going wrong in life when actually God is working at greater purposes.
When we begin to weigh others’ words more heavily than God’s Word, we begin to rehearse narratives about our lives that may not be true. And often, we do not live fruitful or faith-filled Christian lives because instead of looking at God's great capacity to live through us and to accomplish more than we ever could alone, we measure our abilities by our sinful, fallen and flawed self.
Spiritual strength is only found with the Spirit of God living through us--not by us grunting out a works based life that will never measure up. We will never be perfect or adequate on our own, but we are adequate when we walk by faith and live into God's provision for strength, joy, growth and wisdom.
If we are truly to own our lives, we must begin by owning our story and identity spoken to us by our living, loving God.
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