Good morning…
Self doubt erodes us. With the opportunity to see who subscribes and who unsubscribes from my “sue2you” blog each day, I expected to return home to “unsubscribe”, “unsubscribe”, “unsubscribe.” All the way back from Jacksonville, Florida, I unconsciously kept my car on the road as my mind was flooded with growing self doubt.
Last Saturday morning, I wish God had woken me before my 3:00 am alarm, reasoning to my tired self, “If I had more time, I could have gotten done all that needed to be done, done to perfection.” I had worked diligently for weeks on my six morning messages to be scheduled for my blog while I was away on a cruise with my nineteen year old daughter, yet when the clock struck “time to go” in the wee hours, I had only scheduled two posts crafted to my liking. What was I to do at 4:50 am when we left the house to sail away with four messages still unscheduled?
Driving to Jacksonville, I reached out to my friend who had set up my account initially, and she agreed to post for me my four “in process,” sub par messages. With limited internet capacity on our cruise and a desire to focus fully on my young adult daughter, I shot my friend the best four messages I could muster before we set sail at 4:00 pm on Saturday. My worried mind figured, “Better to post sub par, daily messages than to go silent for my days away.” Then, I accidentally pressed “send” to my old “Ladies on Line” subscribers, and I scolded myself, envisioning my years of gaining respect as a devotional writer quickly unraveling.
I cringed when I read my Monday morning message on my daughter’s computer. Misspellings. Inconsistent font. A completely lame message in my estimation. I was embarrassed. Self critical. Angry at my inability to be perfectly all for all, all of the time. The Tuesday message was even worse and I started regretting I had even sent my friend the poorly edited posts. Mistakes galore. Sub par. By far, the worst I have ever written. The next two days held flaws, technically and spiritually. Visions of “unsubscribe” danced in my obsessing head.
Self doubt erodes us. When we let it run rampant, trampling back and forth in our minds, God’s enemy can magnify our fears to zero subscribers. Zero self worth. Zero impact for the kingdom of God.
Honestly, I was scared to open my mail chimp account when I returned home from our once in a lifetime trip, fearing I would face a string of “unsubscribe” after “unsubscribe.” To my surprise, the LORD displayed a reverse effect, gradually adding to the number of those being saved a bit more daily by the trickling of God’s truth through little ole, imperfect me.
Every day they continued to meet together… They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved, Acts 2:46-47 (NIV),
Sue
