My #PerfectLife

I mean, what’s not to love?  I have a great husband who is a great dad to our girls.  I have three beautiful sweet girls.  I have two work-from-home jobs that I really enjoy.  I have friends and community and a great family.  My instagram is full of pretty pictures of me and my family on the beach, me wearing pretty jewelry, pretty cups of coffee and journals, me getting to spend time with Jesus, and some other random pictures of my pretty much #perfectlife.

The truth is, my life is pretty great, and I feel blessed to live the life I have; BUT it is far from perfect.

My marriage isn’t perfect.  My kids aren’t perfect.  My parenting isn’t perfect.  My body isn’t perfect. I’ve been fired from jobs, and my time with Jesus doesn’t always happen everyday.  I don’t always enjoy the mess of life.  I get overwhelmed, and I struggle with fear and anxiety sometimes.  I lose my patience A LOT.  I spill coffee instead of drinking it, burn dinner, fight with my husband, forget to call my friends, and eat junk food.   Sometimes I wish I had a different body, a bigger house, a bigger yard, more money, better time management, a kinder tongue, a baby who took a nap whenever I told her to, kids who never argued, a cook, a maid, and a really relevant story to tell the world.

This week I had the privilege to sit with three other women, hear each of their stories, and share my story.  Our stories couldn’t have been more different: the loss of a child, the loss of a husband, a traumatic childhood, abuse, guilt, job losses, and more.  But the common thread of God’s faithfulness was intricately woven into every detail of each of our stories. Four imperfect women with stories and lives that seem anything but perfect; yet, God somehow has a greater plan and purpose beyond what we can see.  I was reminded of two things that morning.  One was a Bible study I did years ago where we had to write out the timeline of our lives that included all the major events in our lives that changed or shaped us etc…  The second was a church message I heard several months ago about how the span of our lives is just a small tiny blip on God’s timeline of history. We live in the moment only getting to see right now and what has happened in our own past.  We only get to know what is going on in this chapter of the book. We don’t get to see the future or know what happens on the next page.  We don’t get to see the whole story. But we can rest assured that we are part of a story bigger than we could ever imagine.  We are part of God’s story, and we have each been perfectly placed in this moment of time, in this life, in this place, with this family, and with our specific story for a purpose.

Many of us will never see the role our lives have played in the grand scale of God’s bigger picture.  I am reminded of the apostle Paul and the suffering he endured in his lifetime.  His life was anything but perfect.  From a murderer to a man blinded by God for the purpose of opening his eyes, Paul traveled the region spreading the gospel only to be faced with beatings, shipwrecks, death threats, and imprisonment. Paul’s goal was to take the gospel to Spain, yet God allowed him to end up spending his last years in prison.  Paul could have given up, believing the plan was ruined and his story over.  Instead, Paul chose to trust God’s bigger plan that he would never see.  Paul had no idea that the words he penned from his prison cell would be read by the world for millennia to come.  Paul’s nearsighted goal to reach Spain was nothing compared to God’s farsighted, eternal goal to reach the world.

Sometimes we can get the feeling that we’re stuck: that we’re spinning our wheels with nothing to show for it.  We can start to wonder where we fit into the story and what our purpose is.  I realize that my great-great grandchildren and their children’s children will probably never read about me in a history book.  They may not ever even know my name.  One day I will be gone and eventually even forgotten, but I do know that the way I live my life will create a legacy that passes on to my children and grandchildren that will affect their lives and their parenting and their children and their legacies too.  And not just my own kids, but all the other people in my life.  Our lives have a ripple effect that we will never realize.  I want to leave a legacy of faith. I want to leave a legacy of making Jesus beautiful – by expressing gratitude daily, by demonstrating good stewardship in my home and finances, by praying fervently for and with my children, by serving those around me with joy, by speaking truth with boldness, and by demonstrating grace and forgiveness with humility.

I am so grateful that while the story isn’t really mine (because I’m not the author!), He has written me into it.  He has made room for me to be a participant in His wonderful, beautiful story.  And not just a passive participant, but an active participant with the ability to affect change in the world and the people around me as I follow and obey Him. I realize that His purposes can and will be accomplished apart from me, but what an awesome gift it is to obey Him and get to be part of it.

Going back to my friends’ stories and the hard things they’ve each walked through I think about how “imperfect” these stories are, how “imperfect” Paul’s life was, how “imperfect” the lives of the saints were, and how “imperfect” my life is.  But this is my life.  This is the story God was written for me.  My part in the story isn’t over yet, but even when it is, I will live and die knowing that it was just a chapter in a much larger book – one with a really good ending! (Spoiler alert: the good guys win!)  While I don’t actually have a #perfectlife,  I have a perfect Creator and Savior who has perfectly placed me in this time and place and life to accomplish a perfect purpose that matters to the perfect story HE is writing.  So when you start to feel like your life isn’t perfect (newsflash – it isn’t) and your story seems unimportant, remind yourself:

You have been perfectly placed by a perfect Creator for such a time as now.

Don’t try to just survive. Choose to thrive in this #perfect[for you]life He has given you so at the end of it you will hear the words “Well done, good and faithful servant.”   Because of Jesus’ #perfectlife our actual #perfectlife awaits in glory, and I promise you it will be so worth it.

*photo creds @shelbyglynnphotography