The Things I’ve Gotten Wrong

The things I’ve gotten wrong are many. I’ve retreated when I should have said hello. I’ve bent some rules too far and waited too long to voice some of them. I’ve lost my cool with my kids when I intention to disciple them well. I’ve shrank back from asking for help or to borrow something.

But I’ve also jump-started a conversation even when I didn’t feel brave, given grace and structure in places they were needed, been patient at times I didn’t know I could, and asked for help, swallowing my humility instead of my voice.

The thing is that I can always worry about what I’ve gotten wrong, worry so much I can’t get something right. And living frozen is no way to live. Being consumed with where I have messed up messes with me on the inside.

I seek to live missionally in my own neighborhood, but it’s hard to live with a heart wide open when I let my failures deflate me, badger me, and shame me.

Reading from The Passion Translation in Galatians chapter 5, “Let me be clear, the Anointed One has set us free—not partially, but completely and wonderfully free . . . Freedom means that we become so completely free of self-indulgence that we become servants of one another, expressing love in all we do.”

When I am consumed with the things I’ve gotten wrong, I am not free to love and serve those around me well. I withhold. I worry. I self-doubt. I over-analyze.

And my heart is affected. It grows smaller. Harder.

I return to the passage from Galatians, noting the words “not partially, but completely and wonderfully free.” How can I know this freedom, feel it deep in the core of my being? How can I—an imperfect wife, imperfect mother, imperfect neighbor, imperfect friend, “express love in all [I] do”? How can I keep expressing love through my mess-ups?

“Failure means nothing now, only that it taught me life,” wrote Elizabeth Elliot, and her words give me pause.

I know the gift of being present because of the many moments I’m not.

I know the power of gentle words because sometimes mine are not.

I know the deep healing of forgiveness because I’ve been both giver and recipient.

I know the fullness of friendship because I have to work extra hard at times to open up.

I know the way it grows me to be vulnerable and ask for help because I know how it closes off my heart to be stubbornly independent.

In the same vein, I know how rich life lived together with neighbors is because for most of my life I lived my life separate, largely untouched by those I live nearest.

That too, I wish I could re-do, except that community is sweeter when you’ve felt alone, shared meals are richer when you’ve eaten alone, and an open door more life-giving when you’ve lived with it shut.

Perhaps today you find yourself wishing for a re-do. It may feel like the things you’ve gotten wrong are irreconcilable. Maybe you’ve self-labeled as Failure. Imposter. Hypocrite.

You may not have been the parent you wish you could be, the sibling, the friend, the neighbor you wish you were. You may have spoken in haste words you later regret, not followed through on promises you wish desperately now you had kept. You may have shut others out and yourself in, or let blame or bitterness seep in.

Maybe you’ve lived in your neighborhood for years and have not made much effort to get to know your neighbors. Perhaps you’ve walked to the mailbox with your head down, wishing to avoid rather than connect. Perhaps you pull your car into the garage and close the door just as quickly. And now you feel you’ve missed the train, like you will get side-ways glances if you suddenly become a Mr. Rodgers-neighbor.

You want to live a life worth imitating, but you may feel there are simply too many things you have gotten wrong to be able to disciple others in your home, neighborhood, and community. Here you are reading about neighborhood missional living, but you don’t really believe it’s a life available to you.

I pray these words, found in Ezekiel 36, verses 26-27 (MSG), coax out hope: “I’ll give you a new heart, put a new spirit in you. I’ll remove the stone heart from your body and replace it with a heart that’s God-willed, not self-willed. I’ll put my Spirit in you and make it possible for you to do what I tell you and live by my commands.” God’s answer to our past is grace and a new heart.

While I notice first my actions, God sees through to my heart. He sees when my heart longs to be like Him but my steps falter. He also knows that doing the right things for the wrong reasons really isn’t any different than the things I’ve gotten wrong. That apart from grace even my best falls pitifully short.

“The fountain of your pleasure is found in the sacrifice of my shattered heart before you,” I read in Psalm 51:17, TPT. “You will not despise my tenderness as I humbly bow down at your feet.”

Honesty and humility—these are trademarks of a tender heart, the new heart He promises. Perhaps this is how I keep on loving? I keep on “keep on expressing love in all I do”—even when what I do needs to be covered in so much grace—by keeping my heart tender. Moldable. Surrendered.

1 John 4:19, TPT, tells me that “Our love for others is our grateful response to the love God first demonstrated to us.” Filling my thoughts with what I’ve gotten wrong turns bitter my gratitude and stingy my praise. I can stay here, wallowing in regret, but it’s like quick sand. It will pull me in until I can’t see the way out. But filling my vision with Him helps me see the grace He covers me with and gives me the strength to reach up and grasp His hand.

As we close, I would like to share a passage of Romans chapter 7. The author, Paul the Apostle, is wrestling with the double paradox of not doing the things he wants to do and doing the things he doesn’t want to do. First, I want to say that the struggle does not simply affect us in the time in history. Second, listen closely to wisdom he shares at the end.

This is verses 15-25, in the TPT:

15I’m a mystery to myself, for I want to do what is right, but end up doing what my moral instincts condemn. 118For I know that nothing good lives within the flesh of my fallen humanity. The longings to do what is right are within me, but willpower is not enough to accomplish it. 19My lofty desires to do what is good are dashed when I do the things I want to avoid. 20So if my behavior contradicts my desires to do good, I must conclude that it’s not my true identity doing it, but the unwelcome intruder of sin hindering me from being who I really am. 21Through my experience of this principle, I discover that even when I want to do good, evil is ready to sabotage me. 22Truly, deep within my true identity, I love to do what pleases God. 23But I discern another power operating in my humanity, waging a war against the moral principles of my conscience and bringing me into captivity as a prisoner to the “law” of sin—this unwelcome intruder in my humanity. 24What an agonizing situation I am in! So who has the power to rescue this miserable man from the unwelcome intruder of sin and death? 25I give all my thanks to God, for his mighty power has finally provided a way out through our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One! So if left to myself, the flesh is aligned with the law of sin, but now my renewed mind is fixed on and submitted to God’s righteous principles.

Where Paul’s focus is is the direction he moves towards. He closes the gap in proximity to God—simply drawing near. I’m learning that it’s not about the things I ‘ve gotten wrong, because this story I’m living in, it’s not really about me—it’s about Him. It’s about the way He loves us through everything—loves us with a love that can never be broken. It’s about His love that awakens our heart to respond so through Him pursuing us and us pursuing Him we both collide. God near us. That’s His mission.

I’ll share one final encouragement from Elizabeth Elliot before we pray: “One does not surrender a life in an instant. That which is lifelong can only be surrendered in a lifetime.”

Jesus, would You bend our gaze towards You? When we self-doubt and self-criticize and self-condemn, please open our eyes to see another way. We let go of the things we’ve gotten wrong, even the things we’ve gotten “right” but not for the right reasons, and instead look to You. You alone can gift us a new and tender heart. In Your holy and precious name we pray, Jesus. Amen.

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