“Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Matthew 5:48(NASB).
As if there wasn’t enough to worry about, I have to be perfect too. This week was a tough one business wise and personally. Maybe because of celebrating another birthday for my son which made me realize how time is ticking on for me. Maybe it’s trying to find the perfect way to revise NACWIB to be more responsive to the needs of the members. Maybe it’s just being tired from all the traveling I’ve done over the past two weeks.
Whatever it is I asked the Lord to give me some direction. So He told me through prayer “Be perfect.” You’d think a busy, trying to be professional Christian woman would get a break. But God is a God of perfection. Therefore He doesn’t pull punches by giving us a day off from doing the right thing in every aspect of our lives. And as women of faith we should all be thankful for that.
Here’s the deal. In striving to revive the National Association of Christian Women in Business (NACWIB) it started to get a bit tough. What do people really want? What do I provide to be a real service to the members? I was tossing and turning at night trying to figure this all out. Then the problem became obvious. I had gotten away from the focus I keep telling members to keep; keep the focus on God first and only.
For some reason trying to go in a new direction with the Association made me feel unsure. I tried to write posts to encourage you to keep moving forward in your business and I got stuck. I wanted to tell you not to give up and I felt like a fake. It felt too hard; I wanted to give up. The easy thing to do would have been to keep writing as if nothing was wrong, like I had it all together. Don’t I have to appear like I have it all together and tell the members how easy it is to keep going and never have a bad day? The easy thing would have been to fake it till I made it. But there’s a real problem with that when it comes to NACWIB.
The questions I should have been keeping in the forefront included, what does God want for this organization? How would the Lord be glorified through the messages sent to the mailing list subscribers? What would He do to benefit the membership at this particular time? These were the type of questions that would begin the right shift for NACWIB – and for my life.
I made a commitment long ago to create this Association to serve the Lord and be a blessing to you. Therefore, I get stopped in my tracks when I’m not open and honest. Sometimes, I really hate that. I don’t feel “powerful” or like I’m in control the way I feel I’m supposed to be. Instead of feeling like a powerful, empowered leader, I start to feel weak. But in that, I finally figure out how to gain real strength.
In my weakness I remembered to call on the Lord to give me the topics to write about or to know the direction to move in. I asked Him to show me how to do the work. As I started pouring out my heart to Him last night He gave me the verse “Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Matthew 5:48.
I don’t know about you but this verse has always given me a double reaction. First of all, I want to do the right thing before the Lord. Secondly, I feel I’ll never be able to rise up to the task of being perfect according to what I thought this verse required. So I tried to shake off the truth that this verse was given to me for this time.
As you know, when God gives you something it’s going to stick for a long time. Ignore it long enough and eventually the intensity start to fade a bit. You might even be able to chase the thought to the back of your mind periodically. But it will never go away for good. I learned this a long time ago so I know to start praying about this instead of trying to fight it. There are times when women of faith are required to face the hard commands if we like it or not and usually especially when we like it or not. However, this is actually something God makes doable.
The Bible verse “be perfect” means to be complete, to reach a level of maturity in spiritual integrity that lets us exist in the world in a way that is a reflection of God. God tells us to be set apart so we can be like Him. Being exactly like God of course is impossible. To reach the fullness of perfection will never happen as a human being. Even the most powerful of the Biblical saints had their moments of frailty and outright sin. Knowing that could actually provide a moment of relief. But still a woman of faith can assess the grace to escape every temptation to overcome sin (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Today, finding and accessing that grace is a real task. More than ever the opportunity to fall off the wagon in the pursuit of perfection is more possible than ever. Temptations include the normal daily interactions between people, accessibility to social media outlets, negative television programming, excuses to be angry, old problems that are unforgiven, things that are confusing and lead to wrong choices, and on and on and on. Doubts creep in, worry stops by to spend the night, sin happens. You feel stuck, unworthy, like a fake, and get flooded with a lack of confidence.
But that doesn’t take away the responsibility from Christian business women to be perfect. Believe me, I wish it did. Some days I’m just like any other normal business woman. Sometimes I just want to slack off or forget about pushing forward in making this Association better. I want to sit back and just hope people find the website, sign up, and become a member without putting in the effort to show them why it’s important or how joining will make their life better. But that’s falling short of trying to reach a higher level of spiritual integrity as a Christian woman and a woman of spiritual integrity.
Like every woman of faith my choice needs to be to decide to embrace that demand as a blessing. I will be perfect. I will pursue the integrity of doing business not only as something for other people but as a blessing to the Lord. By making Him the focus of my everyday thoughts and activities I continue to seek being perfect. I pray that you will be blessed as a result.