Confessions of a Homemaking Pharisee | Bridget Lester

[image error]It all started a few weeks ago when I began reading a blog series called The Homemaking Pharisee. It is a wonderful series written by a homemaking mama, calling out different ways homemakers are judgmental with one another. At first, I loved this series because I identified with “the judged.” I think every mom has at some point experienced a fellow mom looking down their nose at them for choosing something different than that person, whether it be healthy eating or breastfeeding or vaccinating. It’s fairly easy to identify yourself with “the judged.” It is quite another thing entirely to identify yourself with “the Pharisee”. . . however, that is exactly where I found myself when I came across another blog series.

This one was called The Pendulum Series. It focused on the way we as Christians tend to swing from one end of the pendulum to another when it comes to certain issues. The first entry addressed the “Quiverfull Movement”, and how it can easily lead to becoming judgmental and isolated if we let our beliefs on family planning dictate how we treat other believers. This is where I first felt convicted. I began looking at my own heart and truly asking the Lord to show me my attitude about my beliefs and other believers. What He showed me was appalling. Instead of “love others as yourself” and “live with all men in an understanding way” I found that the prayer of my heart was shockingly similar to the prayer of the Pharisee. . . “Lord, I thank You that I am not like other men!” I had been judging other’s righteousness based on where they stood on MY beliefs, as if I am the standard of anything!!! In truth, seeing the ugliness of my own heart made me feel like less than the lowest tax collector. I really HAD become a Pharisee: clean on the outside, but filthy within. Like the Pharisees, my “holier than thou” attitude was alienating people instead of drawing them to Christ. And like the Pharisees, I was incapable of truly experiencing God when I was so concerned with mine and everyone else’s works. In that moment, I understood for the first time the prayer of the tax collector. “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner!!”

That day, the Lord forgave this Homemaking Pharisee, and she is no more. Instead of praying that the Lord would change the hearts of my friends on certain issues, I am now praying for wisdom to make the right decisions for my own family. Instead of being quick to offer my own opinions to other moms, now I just want to share the love and grace I have been so richly given.

This doesn’t mean that I have stopped believing the Bible is clear on certain issues, or that I have changed my stance on those issues. But it does mean that I have chosen to stop identifying with labels such as “Attachment Parent” or “Quiverfull Mom”, and chosen to stop running around trying to convince everyone that they should be those things too. Instead I have chosen to embrace who I truly am: a fallen sinner saved by undeserved grace; a child of God, sinful, learning, messing up, growing. I now choose to quietly sit at the feet of Jesus instead of praying empty prayers loudly in the street. Oh the sweet freedom of being a little child instead of a Pharisee!! I humbly ask forgiveness for the hurt I have caused to others by being a Pharisee. I hope now to move forward with the words of Jesus singing in my heart. . .”Child, your sins are forgiven. Now go, and sin no more.”

 

[image error]Bridget Lester a daughter to the King of Kings, wife to an incredible husband and mommy to two precious babies. An ordinary woman serving an extraordinary God. Visit her at Set Apart Heart.