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Walking forward or running backward?

“God loves you just the way you are, but He refuses to leave you that way. He wants you to be just like Jesus.” — Max Lucado

One could interpret this quote a variety of ways: 1) God loves me = awesome; 2) God desires greatness for me = awesome; 3)I need to change = ouch; 4) I should be aiming for Christlikeness = great, but difficult a charge

I like this quote a lot. It sums up how I feel about myself: grateful and confident in who God has made me to be, but unfinished and far from where I'd like to be. On the surface, that sounds great. It seems positive that I don't want to become stagnant or get so "comfortable" with myself that I stop pursuing growth. However, something bad happens. The high-achieving perfectionst rares its ugly head in me and turns the healthy desire of self improvement into a very miserable, self-centered place... this mindset of "I can be better" leads me to set super high standards which I fail to meet, resulting in warped thoughts that go something like this: "not good enough," "inadequate," "failure," "never going to get it right," "never going to be like so-in-so." Yuck.

This quote is a reminder that we are on a JOURNEY and there is GRACE along the way because God loves us DESPITE the seemingly huge gap between our conduct and Jesus'. I need to lean on the truth that there is no line connecting our behavior and God's love. We have the same amount of His love on our worst behaving days as on our best. Behavior and love are not related at all.

That should encourage me and take pressure off of me. Unfortunately though, I haven't quite let that seeped in to me... I still find myself in endless cycles of guilt, setting high goals, failing, and then beginning again at guilt. How do I make the knowledge of God's unconditional love and the Gospel finish digesting in my system so that it translates as a guilt free life where I stop striving for perfection and instead walk forward confidently with unearned grace and love at the forefront of my mind?

I honestly pose this question to you. I don't even know if anyone reads this anymore since I decided to stop publishing it through Facebook. I would love any insight you have on this subject of self improvement and striving while also receiving grace and unconditional love freely. I am tired of "messing up" but not quite sure how to set realistic goals while basking in grace...

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