What's The Most Difficult Thing About My Christian Walk?

I’m spending a few days with Acteens at Camp La Vida in Winnsboro, SC. This afternoon, as my part of my work here, I spent about twenty minutes in a question/answer session with the Acteens. One of the questions that has stuck with me since was the question: What’s the most difficult thing about your Christian walk?

Without hesitating, I said something like this:

“Remembering to love myself and show myself grace. I’m really hard on myself—a perfectionist of sorts—so if I’m not mindful of what I’m doing, I’ll catch myself speaking negative self-talk to and about myself. I don’t think that’s what God wants for me, though. I know that God created me uniquely and wonderfully—I’ve finally learned that in time—and I know that God wants me to love myself with the same love that God shows me and that I show those around me. But sometimes I have such high expectations of myself that I’m not really good at showing myself grace when I mess up or remembering that I’m not the only person in the world who has ever struggled or goofed. So that’s my biggest struggle—living as the girl that God created me to be and allowing God to speak God’s truth into my life rather than only hearing the world’s lies.”

For one reason or another, I’ve found myself battling negative words and feelings for the past couple of weeks. Though I know that the negativity is not all true—that I’m not worthless, that I’m doing my best with my job, that I’m where I need to be, that strains on relationships are not necessarily my fault, that I am worthy of being loved, that I’m not a failure, that my passion for worship and spiritual formation really is a gift, that it’s okay to be aggravated and sad and heart broken and that I don’t have to battle against the feelings but that I can simply feel them—I still find myself struggling to embrace words of loving-kindness and grace toward myself.

In staff training last night, I told the girls that their job was to remind themselves, their campers, and their coworkers that we are all uniquely designed and gifted masterpieces of the Creator.

So tonight I will remind you and myself of the same:

I am the uniquely created, redeemed child of the living God.

You are the uniquely created, redeemed child of the living God.

I am loved and lovable.

You are the same.

No matter what anyone may say or any outside influence may indicate.

We are the uniquely created, redeemed, covered by grace, gifted, loved, children of the living, loving God.

Amen and amen.