I’ve been going round and round a particular topic which is about the issue of Christ like perfection. Some times, growing Christains see the race as a struggle and end up focusing on what they are or are not doing instead of fixing their eyes on Jesus. By doing so we start looking back at our old life as more comfortable to live than attending church meetings regularly, loving those that hurt us and trying to pray and praise.  Trying to be perfect affects more than our spiritual life but affects how we live physically too and the unneccessary strains we impose on our selves to measure up to the worlds standard of perfection.While reading the word for today I got a little message on Perfection:

THE WORD FOR TODAY, MAY 18, 2016. FEELING ‘LESS THAN’

‘God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good.’ Genesis 1:31 NKJV
Farai Chideya graduated from Harvard, worked for Newsweek magazine, and quickly rose to the top. Yet she spent years fighting bulimia, trying to become like the glossy images in the make-believe world around her. When she finally broke free from her disease she wrote: ‘Losing weight didn’t change my personality and it didn’t lighten the emotional baggage I carried from my childhood. I thought I wanted to be thin. What I really wanted was to be happy, and neither my looks nor my achievements could do that. Because I couldn’t love or accept myself, the acceptance of others was never enough. When I tried to be perfect I came across as remote and unapproachable, yet the exact opposite was what I wanted.’ Then she shares four life-changing principles: ‘1) Your obsession to be perfect will keep you trapped in loneliness, for satisfying relationships can only be built on honesty and total acceptance. 2) Your obsession to be perfect will force you to see your shortcomings as something to hide, instead of opportunities for growth. 3) Your obsession to be perfect will keep you fixated on what you’re going to be some day, instead of enjoying what you are right now. 4) Your obsession to be perfect will rob you of the chance to make your life count, for by focusing constantly on yourself you’ll have nothing left to give to others.’ Bottom line: God didn’t need to create you, He chose to. On the day you were born He smiled and said, ‘Very good.’ When you fully grasp that, you’ll begin to overcome the problem of feeling ‘less than.’

 Remember that it is God that works in you to fulfill purpose (Phillipians 2:13). He is the one that called you and he is the one that will build you up (Jeremiah 1:5). All you have to do is look up to him and be yourself (Hebrews 12:2a ESV) . What I do especially when I’m feeling withdrawn is that I talk to him and tell him how “less than” I feel. Then I thank Him for being More Than to me and making His grace  sufficient for me. 

Shalom.