“My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love. This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly, living in God’s reality. It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it. For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.
And friends, once that’s taken care of and we’re no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we’re bold and free before God! We’re able to stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we’re doing what he said, doing what pleases him. Again, this is God’s command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.”
1 John 3:18-24
DO you ever find yourself engaging in “debilitating self-criticism”? Beating yourself up over your failures and short comings? If so, you are missing a key point of the gospel.
God knows you. Take a moment to let that sink in. He created you. Every detail about you. Every flaw. Every weakness. He knows you better than you could ever know yourself. And even so, his love is greater than your worried heart or your failures and short comings.
Hanging on to your mistakes displays a lack of trust in the absolute power of God’s grace. By engaging in self-criticism and clinging to our mistakes and weaknesses, you are telling Jesus that you don’t trust when he said in 2 Corinthians 12:9,
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weakness, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
Not only does it display a lack of trust in the power of His grace, it also keeps you from loving others fully. It will also keep you from receiving all that God wants to give you and from going the places He wants to send you.
Go to Jesus and confess any self-criticism you find yourself stuck in. Ask Him to break the shackles and help keep you from obsessing over whatever failure or short coming it is that keeps you bound.
Surrender it to Christ. Ask Him to come fill that space with love in practice to God and others. And every time Satan reminds you of those things, remind him who it is you serve. All your weakness and failure has been covered by God’s grace, through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.
“He has saved us and called us to a holy life- not because of anything we have done but because of this own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.”
2 Timothy 1:9
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