{"id":217,"date":"2008-08-01T09:59:02","date_gmt":"2008-08-01T14:59:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/?p=217"},"modified":"2011-10-01T08:13:14","modified_gmt":"2011-10-01T13:13:14","slug":"confessions-of-a-wordly-over-achiever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/confessions-of-a-wordly-over-achiever\/","title":{"rendered":"Confessions of a wordly over-achiever"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scripture: \u00a0Psalm 63:7<\/strong><\/p>\n

7<\/sup>My salvation and my honor depend on God;<\/p>\n

he is my mighty rock, my refuge.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Observation: <\/strong>My honor and my salvation come from God alone.<\/p>\n

Application:<\/strong> My honor doesn’t come from the things I do and the people I please. It comes from God alone. No matter what I do here on earth I cannot gain \u2018more’ true honor, for honor in Him is all that is truly worthwhile. All other \u2018honor’ is just empty thoughts or regards which will one day vanish when the Lord’s kingdom is restored.<\/p>\n

What is better: \u00a0Fleeting good thoughts from people here on earth or eternal honor which the Lord freely gives to those who seek him?<\/p>\n

Wow. This is still a tough one for me. Again, I understand the concept. Yet it is difficult to truly embrace.<\/p>\n

Over the past few days I have really been thinking about what motivates me to do what I do. I want people to think highly of me. And so I figure out what is highly regarded and go for it.<\/p>\n

I have always been quite the rule-follower and conformist. I earned good grades in school and I was pretty much an over-achiever. (I hope this doesn’t send of you running away from my blog now. I really am a nice person. And God loves me, so there.)<\/p>\n

Please don’t get me wrong. I don’t think any of this was intentional. I’ve enjoyed all the activities I’ve pursued, or if I didn’t, the pursuit didn’t last long. I wonder, though, if deep down inside I wasn’t chasing all those pursuits because with each success I would be rewarded by praise.<\/p>\n

I don’t think that praise from teachers, parents, employers, friends, spouses and anyone else is wrong. But I think by relying on that praise, the focus of true worth is diluted and often lost. My worth has been based on other’s opinions of me. I am realizing this now.<\/p>\n

I have been believing and living a lie. My worth and opinion of myself should not come from other people’s reactions to me. My true worth is based on my relationship to Christ. I am a sinner. I am unworthy of the gift of eternal life which God has given me through his son. And nothing I can do will make me worthy. Yet He has given me that gift anyhow… \u00a0Just because He loves me and because I accepted it. That is where I receive my worth and my honor.<\/p>\n

This is going to be a tough adjustment for me.\u00a0 Perhaps this is why making the transition from working woman to stay at home mom was such a tough one. You don’t get too many kudos from a crying, needy baby, unless you can change your language and find them in different things. I no longer had people telling me I was doing a good job or people responding to my work favorably in other ways. But that’s not what God wants me to rely on. Reliance on that is a lie.<\/p>\n

I have to refocus and find new purpose for doing what I do.\u00a0 I need to do what I should do because it is what I am directed to do by God, my master, because that is what He desires and commands. To do that I need to really pay attention to his word, and his word alone.<\/p>\n

Society will fill me with more lies if I don’t stay close to Him and really meditate on his direction. And I need to accept his gift of worth and not search it our elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Oh this is going to be tough!<\/p>\n

Guess it’s time to pray…<\/p>\n

Prayer:<\/strong> Oh Lord, I am unworthy of your gift of salvation and honor. I have been living a lie, trying to build my worth through earthy things and gaining approval from those around me. You are the only approval I truly need. Thank you for loving me and saving me from death. Please guide me as I change my focus and do things because you command, not to gain favor from those around me. Help me battle the lies of the world with your truth.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Scripture: \u00a0Psalm 63:7 7My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Observation: My honor and my salvation come from God alone. Application: My honor doesn’t come from the things I do and the people I please. It comes from God alone. No matter what I do here on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[5,53,189,52,51],"class_list":["post-217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-soap","tag-christian-living","tag-praise","tag-psalms","tag-self-esteem","tag-self-worth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9333,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217\/revisions\/9333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}