Skip to main content

OK, Father...

 The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.”

 “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

            The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”

         “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.”

             The Lord answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.” (Judges 6:11-16)

 

            He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?”

            He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.”

            Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. (Mark 8:23-25)

 

            A few days ago, I made Imposter Syndrome one of my words for the week because I suspect that a friend is struggling with it. Not too surprisingly, my mind started looking for evidence of I.S. in my life. Naturally, my mind found it pounced on it, and held it up like a victory trophy. “Ta Da! I have Imposter Syndrome in my possession!”

            Isn’t that the way it seems to work. You read about, hear about, or say something about some illness – especially a mental illness – and you find symptoms in yourself. So let’s just say that by 11:30 am, having walked the dog, worked on my clogged kitchen drain, gone to the library book sale (last day, $2 per bag), to the hardware store, and the park for my first load of dirt, and having done some other things around the house, there’s a part of me that says – no, growls, “Failure!”

            But this is the way some of us are. And then someone else comes along and says, “Oh, but you shouldn’t feel that way,” or “Oh, but you mustn’t feel that way.”

            Yeah. That means I’m an even bigger failure because on top of everything else, I’m not thinking the “right” way. And, of course, I’m not thinking in the right way. I’m thinking in the way that Gideon and the man who saw people like trees thought. I’m also dealing with my day the way I deal with projects, meaning that I barely get started, and I’m whining about how it’s a mess, and I made too many mistakes, etc., otherwise known as… the Yuck Factor. Yep, we’re back to that. And the Yuck Factor feeds the Imposter Syndrome, which should turn us toward God, but even if we do turn to God, it’s to whine about what lousy, incompetent, corrupt, stupid, worthless, sinful people we are. Like Gideon.

            And by the end of the day? Chances are pretty good that we’ve accomplished quite a bit, if we don’t spend all day whining. I need to learn to approach such moments of dismay with prayer. “OK, Father… next!” sounds good because it's not about what I am. It's about what He can do through me.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Higher Thoughts

  “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the  Lord . “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)           The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments,   for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord      so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (I Corinthians 2:15-16) If you read about the ancient gods of the various peoples, you’ll find that they think just like people. In fact, they think just like the sort of people we really wouldn’t want to be around. They think like the most corrupt Hollywood producer or, like hormone overloaded teens with no upbringing.   It’s embarrassing to read. I have a friend who argues that because God is not just like us, He is so vastly dif...

Think About These Things

                 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. (Philippians 4:8) This passage is a major challenge for me. Like everyone else, I struggle to keep my thoughts from wandering off into the weeds, then wondering what possible benefits those weeds might have… Sigh. But as a writer, I have to delve at least a little into the ignoble, wrong, impure, unlovely, and debased. After all, there’s no story if everything’s just as it should be and everyone’s happy. As Christians, there are times when we need to deal with all the negatives, but that makes it even more important that we practice turning our minds by force of attention to what is noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy. It’s just too easy to get stuck in a swamp. With my...

A Virgin?

           Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel. (Isaiah 7:14)           This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. (Matthew 1:18)           But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.”            “How will this be,” Mary asked the...