Because of Jesus, we are seen by Him as clean. Without fault. No condemnation. It doesn’t say that He will present us before His glorious presence wishing we were good enough. It doesn’t say that He will present us before His glorious presence even though we have faults. Or that He can’t present us before His glorious presence because of our faults. Because of Jesus’ love and sacrifice for us, in His eyes we don’t have fault. Not because of us; because of Him. And we are presented with great joy. I’ve tried to decide whether the great joy is ours because we are without fault or His because He gets to present us without fault—and I’ve decided that, really, either interpretation is just as precious.
A Personal Reflection
The perfection of this plan brings me to tears every time I spend any time reflecting upon it. Tears of joy and thankfulness. He knows me. He knows that I am, by nature, a perfectionist. And also, by nature, I’m unable to attain that perfectionistic standard set for myself, by myself. I spent a good part of my younger life feeling self-condemnation because of that. Expecting myself to be perfect and really being hard on myself when I didn’t measure up.
My perfectionistic standards prevented me from doing many things…or else I did them, but with great anxiety. I expected myself to get As. That’s it. Anything less than an A was not good enough. I pushed myself so hard to attain that, and for the most part, I succeeded—even in post-secondary education. But it was not worth it at all. I think back to how stressful life was because of that expectation, and I wish I could go back and help my younger self understand the truth I’m sharing with you here, because it would have saved me years of stress and unnecessary strain.
I also expected myself to look perfect. So there was a time in my life when I would eat very little. Or eat a lot and take some laxatives to deal with what I ate. I even made myself throw up sometimes when I felt so disgusted with myself for having had such poor self-control. These self-destructive behaviours never became a pattern for me; nor did they become engrained in my lifestyle to the point that they took over and consumed me. But there was a time in my late teen years when I was tempted to use them from time to time, and the fact that I dabbled in them on and off illustrates that I was not thinking properly about myself. If I had the body now at 40 that I had at 19, I’d be thrilled!! God thankfully showed me the truth about my worth in my very early twenties and freed me from this unrealistic expectation of myself that led to daily self-condemnation and some unhealthy behaviours at times.
I know I’m not the only one who has struggled in this way, which is why I’m sharing this with you now. The only person who knew this about me before I wrote this part of the chapter was my husband. I’m sharing so you know I’m not perfect, and because I’m free from condemnation, I can share my “failures” publicly without fear of condemnation. Sort of “proof,” if you will, that I am truly free. Because if I was not free from condemnation, I would be worried about being judged for admitting to those struggles. Not that some of you won’t judge me—you will. But that doesn’t bother me anymore. Because I truly understand that there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus, so I’m okay with not being perceived as perfect anymore. (Do you hear the lie I used to believe? That these things made me seem perfect? I can hear the lie, loud and clear.)
I also share it so you know that this no-condemnation stuff isn’t just some theory I’ve never had opportunity to practically apply in my own life. I’ve struggled. I’ve lived both sides of what I’m writing about…the self-condemnation side and the no-condemnation side. And the no-condemnation side is way better, so I want it for you as well.
Maybe you can’t relate to my personal example. We are all unique. And some people are blessed with fewer traps in this area of their lives. They are able to let go and not condemn self and others more easily than other people are. If that’s you, take a moment and thank God for that tremendous blessing in your life, because it truly is one. For those of you who have read this chapter and are noticing that God is tugging at you about areas of your life that you have accepted condemnation for, despite what Jesus has done for you, write those areas down somewhere, like that journal we talked about earlier. Then, give them to God. Confess to Him that you have not accepted, until now, that He took care of those “failures” for you already through Jesus. Tell Him that from this moment on you accept that you are free from condemnation because of Jesus. Say that you will no longer accept condemnation as truth, because it is not. Then, claim what the truth is about you.
In case you need some help to get going, Neil Anderson has written an amazing list of who we are in Christ that I have included for you in appendix B, with permission. But I also want you to ask God what His truth about you is and write it in your journal as well. Ask Him, and then sit quietly and listen as His Holy Spirit whispers to you. He will answer you, because He wants nothing more than intimacy with you and longs for you to know Him and for you to be known by Him. He would love for you to understand how He sees you. Start with “I am not condemned for my mistakes, and I am not defined by them,” and see how He reveals the truth about what He thinks of you from there.
If you ask Him to speak to you, and you don’t think He does or all you hear are condemning thoughts, do not think this means that God doesn’t have anything other than condemnation to offer you. What it actually means is that the enemy of our souls is working really hard to keep you stuck in condemnation. Which means to me, Satan knows that you will be really impactful for the kingdom of God when you are not rendered stuck by condemnation. Neil Anderson says Satan knows he can’t change who we are in Christ so he tries to change our perception of it instead. That thought, I think, pairs very nicely with one from Priscilla Shirer in A Jewel in His Crown, which states that Satan knows that if he can get us focused enough on our weaknesses, we will never get around to using our strengths for the kingdom of God.
Think about that for a second. If you weren’t so consumed by the things you think are failures, the things you feel make you not good enough, what would you be consumed with? We’ll talk a lot more about these ideas later on. But for now, I point this out so that you don’t get discouraged, and so you realize that you don’t have to stay stuck. I suggest that you reach out to God (again) about this. It may mean that He will lead you to speak to a trusted Christian friend, counsellor or pastor to help you address this “stuckness” you are feeling. Or it may mean that in your quietness with Him, He will open your eyes to how you have been lured to accept beliefs that are not truth about you, which will be enough to help you break through this attack on your view of yourself so you can feel His love.
Whatever you do, don’t give up. Keep listening. He will speak to you. Maybe it won’t be today. Maybe it will be as you are driving to the store. Maybe it will be as you are falling asleep one night. Maybe you will hear a song and you will feel like He is singing the words directly to you. Don’t forget, the Bible says, “With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day” (2 Peter 3:8), so you might think He is not answering you, but He will. And don’t worry—I don’t think He’ll make you wait one thousand years! Ephesians 3:16–18 says,
I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ. (emphasis added)
Did you catch what that passage is saying to you? That His love for you is wide, long, high and deep. How will you understand that? By being rooted in His love. Rooted. When we root, or anchor, ourselves in the truth—what the Bible says about His love for us, which means no condemnation—we will finally be able to understand just how wide, how long, how high and how deep His love for us truly is. Even a glimpse of that reality has the capacity to overwhelm us…in a good way. In a way that makes a difference. That is life-changing.
I’ll end this chapter by telling you about a woman I met