Mistakes

The message today at church was about mistakes. The story told was from 1 Chronicles 21. It was about David’s sin and the punishment justly given by God for this sin. The pastor ended the sermon with how we should respond to our mistakes. Not only are we to repent and correct our behavior, but we were encouraged to share our stories with others.

I have struggled with feelings of guilt and unworthiness for the countless mistakes I’ve made in my past. Many of my more recent ones have been around how I have handled a high conflict divorce and custody battle with a narcissist. Besides what I should do to help my daughter through this difficult time, I know how God wants me to react when I am confronted with challenges. I know all of this, yet still make ‘mistakes’. I spent many years bottling up my mistakes and feeling guilty and ashamed, wanting to hide them from the world as if they never happened. This guilt would cause me to feel unworthy of happiness, causing me to make even more bad choices…especially when it came to relationships and matters of the heart. I know now that without fully surrendering to God and accepting the gift of forgiveness through the cross, this dark spiral would have eventually consumed me. Guilt is something I continue to struggle with from time to time. Sharing my faults and mistakes with others is also a very difficult thing for me to do. Attention is something that has always made me very uncomfortable, especially negative attention. Yet, God has always known how to reach me, how to pull me kicking and screaming out of the fire that I created around myself. He knows that I will be vulnerable and brave for the chance to help someone. I will be strong in order to prevent someone else from hurting the way that I have, to stop just one person from making the same terrible decisions that I have made to make life worse (not better).

I’ve started to learn that I am here to spread God’s light, no matter how it makes me look. It’s not my story…it’s HIS. He rescued me, despite the darkness and foolishness of my own actions. He stays by my side, even when I tried to push him away. I am loved more than I deserve or could ever fathom! If He wants me to step out of the shadows to reveal the deepest, darkest corners of my life in order to bring glory to Him, then I will be brave and tell my story.