Haunting Ideals

**picture from Yahoo Images

It had "boy adventures" written all over it. My first thought when seeing the big tree with the strong branches extending heavenward was that our son would love having such a climber's paradise in our backyard. 

In fact, my ideal backyard would include a sturdy, wind-proof play set, several rows of raised garden beds, and lots of trees for shade and climbing. It would even have a lovely patio area for dining out on warm summer evenings.

Our real backyard, however, is full or stickers and weeds. The play set we had years ago was demolished in a wind storm, while the trampoline blew into another county. The raised garden beds still haven't gotten built, and a patio area is far down on the to-do list.

Whether it's an ideal backyard or an ideal homeschool day or a generalized ideal life, everyone of us battles the haunting voices prescribing the ideal. The voices can be in our head, on our computer screen, in a magazine, or simply the fruit of our sinful hearts.

It was in my ideal homeschooling plan to put Ink through a writing course. It never happened, but in spite of that, he loves to write, and he's quite good at it, and I have no doubt he'll continue to fine-tune this craft of putting thoughts to paper. 

It's an ideal thing to train our daughters to effectively care for their homes. We aim to cover all of the bases and teach them well. But, did you know that when I got married, I couldn't make rice, didn't know how to fix coffee, and messed up a lot of housekeeping tasks along the way? Yet, here I am a Mom of 8, and though I still battle procrastination, I plan and make delicious meals and manage the laundry and homeschool our children and delegate quite well. 

My ideal kitchen would have granite countertops and new flooring. There'd be a fancy rack overhead for hanging pots, and we'd have lovely matching chairs around our table. Instead, I wipe down worn white laminate every day that's curling up in some spots. We shove pots in a cabinet too small to fit everything well, and we sit on a mishmash of weakened wood and fold-up metal chairs. In spite of all that, we laugh and cook happily in our small, aging kitchen.

Ideals often give us direction. They can offer worthy goals to aim for. But they can also paralyze us or cause deep discontentment. Ideals all too often push us to reach for perfection instead of strive for godliness. 

As women, we're very good at storing up ideals in our hearts and our heads. When those ideals aren't met, we're left frustrated or disappointed or fearful, but we can't resist the temptation to continue to chase after them. Ideals lead us to the Land of If-Only, far away from the truth that godliness with contentment is great gain. They keep us focused on tomorrow or someday and rob us of the joy of this day.

Resting our lives on ideals is building on shifting sand. The ideals will never be satisfied. You'll have to keep feeding them and doing one more thing or buying one more thing. Ideals shift with the seasons, and they tempt us to be glory-stealers, taking what belongs to God and giving it to ourselves. Ideals blind us to God's provision in every trial and every moment of our lives as they whisper that God's providence is merely an interruption to our perfect plans. Ideals rob us of seeing the beauty of His grace that takes the impossible and makes it possible. Ideals convince us we're self-sufficient instead of God-dependent.

Just look at your life. Like I do, you stand amazed at the wondrous things God has done. You're in awe how He's made something beautiful out of a mess, how He's given a selfish heart a desire to serve others, how He's worked all of your trials for good, making you more and more like Jesus every day. And none of that happened because you had the ideal Quiet Time, the ideal parenting method, or the ideal schedule. It happened because of that amazing gift called grace.

Let's use those ideals properly, to motivate us or give us direction. But let's hold on to them loosely, realizing they'll never satisfy us because we weren't designed to live out an ideal, but rather to bring glory to God and enjoy Him forever.

With love,

Trisha