Letting Go

Grabbing the hot muffin pan without a second thought, the scorching metal seared my fingers. I yelp (more like cuss) and the let pan drop to the oven door, spilling it's contents and bouncing onto the floor. I look at the orange goopy mess and am not sure whether to laugh or cry. 

It's just been one of those days where I've truly been on my knees asking for God's grace and a refreshed heart. I cannot changed my heart or my attitude through my own will power or hard work. God's grace is sufficient for me even when I cuss out the muffin batter spilled across my oven or cry over the fact that my husband isn't home the moment I want him home. 


A friend mentioned Ann Voskamp's book and blog to me yesterday and I've been captivated by her words of wisdom, full of Gospel truth, powerful writing style and pictures that make me long after better photography skills. 


I was browsing through her posts tagged with homemaking and point number six in this article struck a chord with me. " Homemaking is about making a home, not about making perfection. A perfect home is an authentic, creative, animated space where Peace and Christ and Beauty are embraced. Perfect does not equate to immaculate. "

I'm not going to lie. I'm not even sure I know what she means by "an animated space where Peace and Christ and Beauty are embraced." What does that mean for me in a practical sense? Spiritually? I pray the Lord will guide me to understand how to create a home where those virtues are embraced. 

I've been home a lot this week and I feel this pressure when I'm home to work as hard all day long as my husband works at school or as hard as I would on a job. Homemaking is my job and my calling and today I felt this suffocating, overwhelming guilt to stay busy all day long without ceasing for a moment or I would be eating the bread of idleness. Sometimes the Proverbs 31 woman stresses me into perfection.

What a mistake I've made. She is a picture of a woman in Christ who loves and serves the Lord and her family. She is what to strive towards, not what we must become. She is a fallen sinful woman just as I am. While she is a model for women and mothers I am nothing without Christ. Even with Christ, I will never reach perfection this side of heaven nor is it the Lord's will for me to keep a perfect house. 

I'm still not sure how to let go of my expectations for perfection but the Lord know. 

(Speaking of letting of perfection, I have no idea why the fonts are different sizes, it says they're the same when I was writing but it published in two sizes. Also does anybody know how to make the space between paragraphs smaller?)