I have one item packed away in my life that is getting too heavy for me to carry. Do you carry this weight too?

After a recent trip to the UK for our 40th birthdays, my husband I learned the value in living (and packing) lightly. This principle applies to my right-now life so we’re going to spend some time on it over the next few articles.

Let’s take a look at someone carrying around a boatload of shame. In John 21, Jesus has died and risen. Peter has denied and sunk, sunk into sadness and failure at not living up to the bravado he so publicly proclaimed.  Now Peter is back at work fishing for fish instead of fishing for men, and I can imagine that the weight is almost too heavy for him to carry. Just like Peter, I’m carrying around a similar weight… the weight of my failure.

There are two ways I feel this weight:

  1. When I sin. My anger turns into yelling, I harbor jealousy and unforgiveness, and I do things I shouldn’t do. Then I carry the weight of these things around instead of accepting God’s grace.
  2. When I “should.” I should be working out five days a week. I should be the room mom. I should lead that bible study and serve in the nursery and evangelize at the mall and go on that mission trip. While “shoulds” are not sins, they carry a similar weight and they remind me that I need to get it together. And one thing this Achiever cannot stand is feeling incapable.

Here’s the deal. I should feel convicted by sin and perhaps that “should” pressing in on my heart is a little nudge to send me in a more productive direction. The problem is that I carry the weight of the failures, the sins, and the shoulds with me everywhere I go. And some of us have set up camp with it.

And when we decide to carry the weight around, Satan uses it to distort our identity in Christ. He wants us to believe that our past dictates our present and future, that God can’t use us as we are, that we shouldn’t accept His gifts, and that we are unworthy of His love.

But it’s time to learn how to live lightly by shedding the weight of failure, sin, and “should”

I sometimes forget that Jesus takes away all my sin. Not just a sin here or there, but the entire record … and then He nailed it to the cross. (Colossians 2:13–14) God says He will no longer remember my sins for the purpose of punishment. (Hebrews 10:16–17) He doesn’t remember my sins, not because they are unimportant, but because they’re forgiven. The weight of my failure is a heavenly reminder that my weakness allows Jesus’ power to work within me. (2 Corinthians 12:9–11) This means that the weight of my failure is the part of my story that leads me to Jesus.

So I have a choice to make about: Will I carry around the weight of the failure until it becomes the filter by which I think, speak and act? OR will I run to Jesus and lay the weight at His feet?

What do you do when you fail? Is it run into the arms of the one who loves you? For Achiever Jill, it’s a resolution to do better and try harder and read that article about how to never fail ever again. But Peter shows the better way.

Thankfully Peter’s story didn’t end on that fishing boat. When Jesus comes out to the sea and tells the men to throw their nets to the other side, John exclaims, “Hey, it’s Jesus!” Then Peter jumps into the water. Oh friends, instead of sinking further into the shame, Peter runs out to greet Jesus. Then Jesus tells him that his identity is secure, his past doesn’t dictate his future, and Jesus still loves him.

My Achiever friend, let’s lay down the weight of failure, sin, and “should” so that we can live lightly. May we remember that we are sinners safe in the hands of a loving Father who wants us to come running so He can take our failure and turn it into a testimony of His goodness and grace.

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