Have you ever had one of those days where you feel like you can’t do anything right?
It always seems to happen when you’re completely overwhelmed by all that you need to accomplish in one day. The laundry pile is taller than you are. The dishes are overflowing from the sink. Little bits of goodness-knows-what stick to your feet as you walk across your unswept, unmopped kitchen floor. Every bit of table and counter space is covered with random objects that need to be put away. You really want to knuckle down and clean the house from top to bottom, but there are errands to run and you still need to make dinner at some point.
As you’re bustling around your home trying to get things done, one wrong move on your part sends full kettle of water off the counter and onto the floor
Water is everywhere. You find yourself cursing at an inanimate object. Still, you sop up the mess and try to move on with your day.
Not ten minutes later, it happens again.
That exact same kettle falls to the floor. There’s water everywhere, and something just snaps inside of you. You can’t do anything right. You’re a failure.
Well, that’s how I felt, anyway, when this exact scenario played out in my home last week.
I beat myself down for failing to meet my own, unrealistic standards of what a responsible, organized woman should be able to manage. As usual, I believed that every other woman I know has her life together, and I will never measure up.
Thankfully, over the last few days, God has used some lovely friends to remind me that all women feel like this in different ways in all seasons of life. Often, we believe that we have failed as women, wives, or mothers. We think that we will never get things right in our homes, careers, or ministries.
At this point, you might be expecting some encouragement along the lines of “Don’t be so hard on yourself! You don’t have to be perfect!”, but that’s not quite what I’m after today.
While I think reasonable expectations are absolutely necessary, limiting our focus to that kind of practical advice may cause us to miss out on how God can use our feelings of failure to make us more like Christ.
When we feel like we can’t do anything right, our hope doesn’t lie in embracing the chaos or in being trapped by unhealthy perfectionism. When we fail, we’re presented with an opportunity to humbly find our place before God, who is rich in mercy and brings glory to Himself through our weakness.
Our Failures Humble Us
When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom. Proverbs 11:2
Pride is a dangerous temptation that we struggle with on good days and bad. It’s easy for pride to creep into our hearts when life is running smoothly. In those moments, we’re quick to forget our need for God. We arrogantly accept credit for success without acknowledging God’s faithful provision.
On the bad days, when our lives are disorganized and our homes are a disaster, we can be more wrapped up in worry that others will see our failures than we are concerned about conquering the actual mess. We’d rather hide the clean laundry behind a closed bedroom door than actually fold it and put it away. We want our friends and family to think we’re better than we actually are.
Whatever the state of our homes on a given day, the main problem is the state of our hearts. When we measure our value based on how others will perceive the way we look, speak, behave, and manage our homes, we have given pride a foothold in our souls. We need God to bless us with humble wisdom. We must remember that we are flawed, imperfect beings who have nothing to offer to our infinite, perfect God. We are wise when we humbly acknowledge that reality and don’t allow pride to puff us up.
God is Merciful to the Weak
But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. Titus 3:4-7
No matter how excellently we work at our jobs, serve in our ministries, raise our children, or manage our homes, we will never do it well enough to impress God. We will always fail in some way, and need His strength to get through each day. What a humbling reality.
Still, we have reason to celebrate! Although we are weak and helpless, God does not leave us in that sorry state. In His mercy, He perfectly covers over our many mistakes with the blood of His Son and allows us to enter into a relationship with Him.
We were sick and wretched, trapped in our sin, yet He mercifully redeemed us. He tended to us in our weakness, cleansing and renewing us by His blood and through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Even though we fail time and time again, we have the hope of eternity because of His mercy.
God Uses Our Weakness to Showcase His Glory
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Our failures remind us that it is foolish to attempt to live a God-honoring life in our own strength. We can’t do it on our own, and, thankfully, we don’t have to! The power Christ offers us can’t fully rest upon us until we come to the end of ourselves. God’s glory can only be perfectly displayed through our lives when we humbly acknowledge our weakness and surrender control to Him.
When we surrender our wills to God, the Holy Spirit equips us with power beyond ourselves to live and serve to His glory. We are granted endless love and joy, unfailing peace and patience, boundless kindness and goodness, and perfect faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. All these things are given to us beyond what we could ever muster up on our own.
The next time you feel like a failure, take a moment to check your heart. Are you falling into a trap of pride? Ask God to give you wise humility. Thank Him for His mercy to you in your imperfection, and ask Him to replace your weakness with His strength.
Here’s a simple prayer to get you started:
Gracious Father, today, I feel like a failure. Everything I do seems to be going wrong. I feel like I don’t measure up. God, help me not to give in to foolish pride. Give me wisdom to humbly acknowledge my shortcomings instead of pretending to be better than I really am. Remind me of your gracious mercy to me in my weakness and move my heart to praise you. Use my weakness to remind me of my need for you. Give me a desire to surrender my will to you for your glory. Amen.
Respond
How do you embrace humility and stamp out pride, both on good days and "epic fail" days? How have you seen God use your weakness to showcase His glory?
