High price of being over-invested

All my life, I had been over-invested without realising it. Call it aiming for excellence or whatever you wish, it had left me a dreadful legacy of sermon post-mortems or deep regret and guilt that some christian event or programme didn't fulfil all my expectations. Basically, it was an obsession – that my life be "without spot" and wrinkle-free. A counsellor friend suggested I was spending my life as "a tight-rope walker."

I remember the distressing thought that plagued me over not seizing an opportunity I had to have our older children videoed when they were small at a local park. My failure to think creatively enough in the moment meant that I made a different "call," and as the years went by, so that we approached each of their 21st birthdays, I had no video clip to pull out that I might have hidden away for years and brought out to surprise them. Every time, I stood behind a father with a video camera slung over his shoulder, I berated myself!

I think the dictionary has a word for it – perfectionism! Getting things just right, doing it perfect. Oh the web we weave! It can result in a "tight-rope walk," as all our energy goes into avoiding every imperfection, every flaw. If only I had stopped and asked myself – is all this self-criticism helping me live a richer, more fulfilling or satisfying life?

Jesus wasn't a perfectionist, praise God! And He doesn't ask us to be one either. Can we imagine Him only being half there with a person because He was still doing a postmortem on what happened in the synagogue or the last conversation.

Yet, the gospels clearly show Christ in all His humanity, and he doesn't call me to be a "plastic saint" or to cut myself off from the human race. I wonder, how willing are we to let our humanity be on display? Perhaps, it begins with having the courage which will allow us, give us the space, to be less than perfect. After a difficult week, to have the transparency within myself and before the church family that I can say "Woops! Looks like I'm falling again." To make a mistake – and still rejoice to see the work in progress!

A new song

Life's great illusion is that in coming to life, I somehow had to do it perfect. Once that is entrenched, I will always feel somehow defective. But more than that – when perfectionism trails me around, it leaves a guilt song in its wake (I should have got it right), and there's no room for a praise song.

I dare say this is what Jesus saw in Martha. He wanted her to worship at His feet, as Mary did. Instead she drove herself like a "performing seal," to get her act seamless and not leave any part of the cooking or cleaning undone, and in it all, she lost the real person, the real Martha. The praise had gone in the midst of a flurry of work.

Guilt enlarges, it never diminishes the problem. For me, perfectionism was the struggle to have faith in my own journey, that "surely (God's) goodness and mercy will follow me all of my life" (Psalm 23:6).

What would it look like if I approached each day with the attitude:

Today, I make myself available to my King Jesus. Some things I have prepared for, other events will take me by surprise. I will seize the moment, do my best in God's strength and trust Him for the outcomes, knowing that each day is a mile marked, a mountain climbed.

What if we were to appreciate that to the extent we strive to be perfect, we lose God's companionship! He doesn't work with perfectionism. Rather, Paul states quite emphatically, "when I am weak (i.e. am willing to acknowledge my abject weakness before Him), then I am strong (2 Corinthians 12:10)." Then each time I muck up, I can reflect, "What a blessing, to learn all this about myself!" Some people will be blessed by what I do, others offended but always, I will move forward to the next moment. Along the way, I have learned to "live with the greys," to embrace the fact I only have feet of clay.

Terry Waite, taken hostage in Lebanon from 1987, then held in solitary confinement for five years, resolved there would be no recriminations. "Otherwise, I shall wither under the barrage of my own self-criticism." And I choose to wear the coat of NSCA as I move into every new sunrise or sunset – no self-criticising allowed. Only Satan benefits if I am paralysed by the past.

It is His intention to flow in grace and power through the personality of His imperfect servants. This is part of His glory.

I will only invest in God's love for me and His love for those He intends to touch through my life. That sovereign love can make good of every seeming mistake or failure of mine. Indeed, some such occasions are nothing at all like I imagined. George Muller once gave a message which he considered to be the most barren of his life, then in weeks to come discovered there were 41 distinct cases of blessing that had come to the listeners as a direct result of their hearing that message that day. We are never the best judges of how well we have done or how effective we have been.

Beware - perfectionism in preaching or worshipleading, or any area of church ministry is a "bottomless pit."

We do not "live or die" by human approval. My world doesn't have to "cave in" if I've missed balancing the books, forgotten an important prayer need or if I've overlooked someone on my Christmas email list.

The perfectionist keeps wanting to make it better (even a sermon that's already been preached). Meanwhile, the psalmist gives us that restorative assurance more than two and a half millennia ago. Because the Lord is my Shepherd, there is nothing lacking. There's nothing left wanting (Psalm 23:1).

Where does that leave me now? So, something didn't go well at church, it didn't have perfect execution. I run through my mind – I didn't pray adequately the week before. There's the picture again. Everything depends on me. I am the ringmaster! No it doesn't, no I'm not.

Picture again – Wayne Martin the baby. No theology, unable to pray, unable to perform, didn't know how to get it right. Yet God was delighted with me, He was devoted to me. Nothing has changed!

I do not have to give "have I done enough" feelings any more "air time."

God's love for me is always turned on full blast.

Next time, I am tempted to camp out on an event (a sermon, a counselling session, a small group study, an interaction with a friend or work/church associate) that wasn't a "perfect 7," I will say, "looks like I'm falling again," and go on to avail myself of the grace of God – or else, I've missed the whole point of why Jesus came for me. 1 Corinthians 15:10 (The Message): "I'm not about to let His grace go to waste."

I will also remember the words of the US Coast Guard, "Save the one in front of you." I can no longer correct a situation from yesterday but who has God placed in front of me today who needs saving, feeding, helping, blessing? They are my assignment for now and nothing else matters.

What is my life attitude now? It's about rechoosing grace. It's about rechoosing love, it's about unconditional love for imperfect people, beginning with me.