My Cardboard Testimony

Our church recently made a video of some of our attenders sharing their "Cardboard Testimonies". What is that you ask? Basically, everyone is given a large piece of cardboard. They then describe in a short sentence or phrase a condition or situation in their life from which God rescued them or changed them. On the back side of the cardboard, the person writes how their life has been changed by God's grace. The video above is an example of another church doing the very same thing. Watch it. It's really amazing.

I had planned what I would write for my cardboard testimony, but I never got around to filming it for our video. (So, Scott, if you're reading this, I did get your email and planned to be there the 2nd day of filming, but Mommy was too pooped with Daddy being out of town for the third night in a row. Let's just say, the kids won that day!) So here's what I would have written:

Front: PEOPLE-PLEASER
Back: GOD-PLEASER

If there's one thing God has been teaching me, it's to focus on pleasing Him with the unique life He has given me. I used to think that a "good Christian girl" had to talk, walk and act a certain way (and had to go to a certain type of church!) because after all, wasn't everyone watching me and learning from me what a Christian is supposed to look like? How many of us who've grown up in church have heard the guilt-inducing question, "If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would you be convicted?" It was ideas like these that got me thinking in the wrong direction for many years in my life. I was actually more concerned about how my life appeared to others than how it really was in my heart, the part that only God sees. I was more concerned with fitting an imaginary mold than being the unique woman God intended for me to be.

I lived much of my life trying to look like the perfect, got-it-all-together, "good Christian girl", wanting to please all the people around me. One of the problems with the generic "good Christian girl" approach to life is that I became very legalistic in the way I viewed myself and my own behavior. It was all about doing the right things - not about being the right person. Naturally, I also projected my legalistic view of myself onto others, judging them unfairly. I found myself making choices out of sense of guilt, instead of a conviction of God's leading in my life. I also became afraid of stepping outside the imaginary mold, and therefore, I am sure I missed opportunities where God was calling me to fill a role He intended for me. I am confident that I am not alone in having lived much of my life with this flawed sense of self.

Through all of this I am learning that God created me as a unique individual with a specific purpose to be a part if His grace-filled plan for redeeming this imperfect world and all us within it. He did not create me and then assign me to simply fill a generic role. The legalistic, people-pleasing "good Christian girl" life is never what God intended for me. So, if I were put on trial for being a Christian, would I be convicted? I certainly hope so, but not because I follow a prescribed set of rules that anyone could keep, but because I hope to be seen as a woman after God's own heart. Out of a pure heart flow pure actions (it's never the other way around, as so many of us live it), and I need to be concerned with the condition of my heart - the part of me that only God truly sees.

How about you? You are a unique creation of God, too. God didn't design you to fill a generic mold. Are you living to please Him and fulfill His unique purpose for your life?