Remember The Garden
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By now, I’m sure we have learned that I am quite open about my past and present struggles. I choose to be transparent because A) It keeps me honest and credible as I write, and B) It’s a form of therapy for me that helps me process and heal. And I do pray that as I share my life and my heart, others will find freedom, too. Specifically, as it relates to this Reach, freedom in imperfection.
I struggle—wrestle—with perfectionism. I’m a firstborn, so statistically speaking I’m on par with my other fellow firstborns. At my core, I like order. I like for things to be done well. I like efficiency. I like having a plan. I like times and timeframes. I like details. I love spontaneity, but I also love not flying by the seat of my pants.
And motherhood has taken out every single one of those preferences. Now, order is fleeting. Things tinker on the edge of being done. Efficiency is out the window. Timeframes are relative and attempted. Details are in excess and often forgotten. And as far as flying by the seat of my pants… well, the pants are missing.
(They’re probably lost at sea in the pile of clean laundry that lives on my dining room table—if you’ve been to my house, you are well acquainted with what I’m referring to).
Needless to say, my brain is in crisis trying to regulate itself and figure out, as my three-year-old daughter says, “what is going on??”
Perfection, what I desire and exhaust myself obsessing over, is an impossibility.
If I pay close attention, God allows refinement to come in many ways and He will not allow me to ever be perfect. I have to adapt and overcome… and lay my preferences down. More importantly, I need to be OKAY with my preferences being laid down. And, for the sake of being honest, I am having a hard time… and then I feel guilty for having a hard time in the first place! Like what kind of mother am I? [Why am I not instantly willing and excited to lay my needs and desires and preferences down for my children?]
And, the Holy Spirit just brought to my mind, right after I wrote that… a scene on a dark night, there in the Garden of Gethsemane. The Lord pleading for this cup to be taken from Him, blood perspiring heavily along His hairline, the cup that required the brutality of laying His life down for His children. (I have tears in my eyes just remembering and writing that.)
He wasn’t skipping to the Cross. He wasn’t covering up His true feelings with flippant Christian phrases like, “Not today, Satan! God is good! I just need to be strong and full of faith!” No… He was vulnerable, and He was honest. Actually, He was terrified. Luke 22:41-44 (LITV) says:
And He was withdrawn from them, about a stone’s throw. And falling on His knees, He prayed, saying, ‘Father, if You will, take away this cup from Me; but let not My will be done, but Your will.’ And an angel from Heaven appeared to Him, strengthening Him. And being in agony, He prayed more intently. And His sweat became as drops of blood falling down onto the earth.
What level of agony does one have to be in to sweat blood? I did some research, and this is what I found (ChatGPT):
(1) “Sweating blood, medically known as hematidrosis, is an extremely rare condition that occurs under conditions of intense physical or emotional stress. The agony or stress level required is extraordinary—far beyond normal anxiety or fear.
(2) Stress level: It typically happens during life-threatening situations, such as:
(a) Facing torture or execution
(b) Enduring overwhelming psychological trauma
(c) Experiencing severe fear or panic
(3) One would need to be in extreme physical, emotional, or psychological agony—to the point of crippling terror or overwhelming grief—for hematidrosis to occur. It’s a rare and dramatic physiological response to extreme suffering.”
While He was and is perfect, there is nothing in this account that says that Jesus Christ tried to mask His pain, “hold it together,” or not show that He was in agony.
And He wove His Word together in such a way as to reveal that scene to all of us—four times, in four different gospel accounts, and within the prophecy of Isaiah in chapters 52 and 53. And does the Bible say He felt guilty for not having a sunny disposition regarding laying down or being excited to lay His life down for His children? It most certainly does not.
Jesus was fully God,
and He was also fully human.
And only He was perfect.
I think perfection, a byproduct of pride, drives us to think we are and need to be better than our Savior. What do I mean by that?
We may think that because we’re Christians, we cannot show weakness. That we cannot be vulnerable. That we cannot display our scars or battle wounds. That because we’re Christians, we always have to be strong and positive. That it’s the Christian thing to do.
These “reasons” are none other than the hisses of a serpent plotting to keep God’s children in bondage, and then laughing as the chains continue to tighten. Because these “reasons” are the complete antithesis to the scene of our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane.
The Bible is clear regarding what it includes and what it does not include. What it names and what it does not name. Jesus Christ—the perfect image of masculinity and strength—the Author of His Word, intentionally included the scene of Himself agonizing in the garden not once, but four times.
So what does this have to do with “overcoming perfectionism”?
I do not need to “hold it all together” in a false image of perfection because “I’m such a strong Christian.” If my Savior did not portray Himself as “holding it all together” moments prior to His betrayal and arrest to be led to the slaughter, then who am I to think I am better than He? If He was vulnerable, I must be vulnerable. If He asked His disciples for prayer, then I must ask for prayer. If He is on His knees pleading with the Father, I must also be on my knees, regarding the Father with the same reverence. If His cup was not taken from Him, then I, too, must respond with, “Thy will be done.”
I’d also like to add—not only is it an “I must be,” but it’s also an “I get to” or an “I am free to.” I am free to be vulnerable; I am free to ask for prayer; I am free to show my humility; I am free to kneel before the Father. I am free to not have it all together. I am free to be imperfect and deeply flawed. I am free to sincerely depend on my perfect Savior. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1 | ESV).
Despite what my flesh says and what the serpent hisses into my ear, God does not call me to be perfect nor does He require perfection. What He does say is, “Be Holy, because I am Holy” (Leviticus, 1 Peter 1:16). And I think a part of being Holy and set apart is confidently sharing our weaknesses so as not to give the enemy a foothold in our lives, and also in the lives of our brothers and sisters. The most palpable times I can remember the feeling of a chain being broken… was when somebody shared something vulnerable. And, by the power of the Holy Spirit, it set me free. I have felt those chains break and life rush in to those places, that were once painfully tender, due to the humility of other believers.
One final thing I want to point out in the Garden of Gethsemane—when Jesus was praying asking the Father to take His cup from Him… the Father responded. He did not take the cup away, but the verse says that “an angel from Heaven appeared to Him, strengthening Him.” God had mercy, for He honors humility.
Jesus was vulnerable.
Jesus was honest.
He pleaded with the Father for another way.
So next time you are tempted to hide or conceal, or feel like a failure because you do not feel like a “strong Christian”, or feel like giving up because your desires or plans are not playing out the way you would like for them to, fill in the blank—… there is a scene on a dark night, there in the Garden of Gethsemane…
Remember the garden.
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 ESV).
“Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen” (1 Peter 5:9-11 ESV).
