I can't tell you how many times I've had memories come to mind out of left field, something I did twenty years ago, a time I wasn't as nice as I should have been to someone or just the dumb things you do and say as a kid, teenager, or last month. Then I immediately feel like hiding my face, pulling the covers over my head or just jumping in a hole, and there is no one around! No one knows the thought going through my head. It isn't related to anything I'm doing at that moment or where I am. Yet the shame and guilt hits you like a ton of bricks without any warning. It's not like these are major offenses either, I mean I don't have a criminal record and I was always a "good kid". I never did anything major, but I'm a human. An unkind word, an immature action, a wrong way of thinking, or just a plain old embarrassing moment where I was momentarily a dumb blonde. You know one of those "how could I have been so dumb?" or "how did I not see that?".
Maybe I'm the only one who ever experiences this blast from the past phenomenon, but I know everyone has to deal with attacks like this in some way or another. Maybe you deal with a constant nagging that your not good enough as a mom or your too much in some other way. Whatever it is the enemy will try to find a way to convince us that we are not good enough or we're too much to handle. I feel the pressure all the time. Like I'm failing and not doing a good enough job of running a home, being a good wife, keeping up with family or friends. Thinking I should have a better career or else have started a family by now and be super mom. I know in my heart that all of these things are not true, that through Jesus and what he did for us all I have been made the righteousness of God and am made perfect and complete in Him (2 Corin. 5:21). But boy does the enemy not want us to live like that. If he can keep us mired down in the "what ifs" and "I'm not good enough"s he can keep us from accomplishing the great things that God has planned.
I've been thinking a lot the last few days about the scripture that talks about fighting the good fight of faith (I Tim. 6:12). I've heard others say before, a good fight is one that you win. I know I've already won because of Jesus but there is a daily battle of the mind to keep it focused on what God says about me instead of what the world or guilt and shame says about me. I've been so blessed by the amount of teachings and music on God's grace in recent years. Having spent many years in an environment that was so much about works and doing the right thing, being constantly reminded of God's grace has been refreshing. It's freeing to be reminded that it isn't about us, which is what the devil would love for us to think. It's about Jesus and what He did for us and dying on the cross as us, in our place. Because He was and is more than enough we don't have to succumb to the feelings of guilt and shame. He already bore them all and set us free! We just have to believe it and walk in it. That is where I think sometimes the hardest part of the fight of faith is, to resist those thoughts and feelings and replace them with what God says about us. Thankfully that's why He gave us His Word, sometimes I just have to repeat a scripture over and over again to myself to remind me of who I am in Him. I'm thankful to have that "sword of the spirit, which is the word of God) (Eph. 6:17). It wins the fight every time.
I just wanted to remind myself and anyone else reading this that just because those thoughts and feelings come don't give in to them. We've got to fight the good fight and instead of letting those thoughts stay, focus on what God says about us that we've been made righteous in Him, our sins have been washed away and there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). We are enough in Him because He is enough. He took care of it all so we could cast our cares on Him. I tend to think and feel that I need to do everything myself so trying to let go and let God can be a struggle, but it's one I'm getting better at day by day. I pray this post will be encouraging to someone and that you'll continue fighting that good fight and realizing that Jesus already won it for you too.
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