measure.

February 26, 2013

Ever feel like you don't quite measure up?
I struggle with this all the time.

I feel like I'm never skinny enough.
Or pretty enough.
Like my house is never clean enough.
Or that my days are not productive enough.
I feel like I am not smart enough to be home schooling my kids
and that I may be failing them somehow.
I often feel like I am not a good enough wife.
Sometimes, I think that I don't push my kids hard enough.
Or that I push them too hard.
Most often, I feel like I am not patient enough or unselfish enough
and that I don't show the love of Jesus nearly enough.
There are seasons where I feel like I don't pray enough.
Or that I get too lazy to focus others' needs.

I look around me, and it seems that everyone else has it together.
Other moms have figured out how to parent
 without ever losing her cool.
Their kids are well behaved and always obedient.
I see marriages where the husband & wife
are always on the same page.
I become super secretly envious of those women
who are always so full of energy.
And there are those who seem to have all the answers.

I just can't seem to get everything together.
It's like I can't juggle all the balls at one time
and keep them ALL in the air.
I can handle a few at any given time.
But without fail, once I try to add them all in to the mix,
some are going to drop to the ground.
And hard.

I hope that there is someone out there, reading this,
who can identify with me.
Please tell me that I'm not the only one
who sometimes has to swim with all her might
just to keep from drowning.
Don't get me wrong, sometimes when I swim,
I feel like Michael Phelps!
But, most often I am in need of a Lifeguard.

I've learned that when I rely on mySELF,
I can make a really big mess of things.
mySELF wants to be lazy & self-righteous.
mySELF does not want to put others first.
mySELF wants all the applause.
mySELF can never be enough.
It's only when I go to God in prayer,
asking for the Holy Spirit to fill me with a
measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over
will I ever be enough.

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened." Matthew 7:7-8

"I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." Romans 12:1-2