Hypocrite

I am about to deliver my first sermon tomorrow. I was supposed to deliver it two weeks ago, but our young adults group was snowed out both last week and the week before. I was confident those two weeks, confident in the sermon, in my ability to present it, and in myself.

This weekend changed all that. I now feel like a hypocrite for saying what I'm going to say. The message is about how to change. Tomorrow will be about the ways we fail to change, and then next week will be the true reason we fail and how to actually start a real change in our hearts. (I had to condense a three-week series to two weeks due to the cancellations.) I feel like a hypocrite because this weekend revealed to me that I hadn't changed as much as I thought I had. I'm still me. I still struggle with things that I know in my head should be given over to God, that are senseless for me to worry about and impossible for me to do anything about.

And maybe this is the best thing that could have happened for the series. I say that not only because it will make me rely on God and God alone for the delivery of the message, but it adds a strong element of honesty to it. I have the changes that have happened, thank God, but my idealistic "I'm all better now" facade that I've lied to myself with has been put away...at least for the time being.

What this weekend should have done for me is give me more compassion for those who also struggle to change. It has a little, but mostly, it fed my anger and self-hatred. Why? Because I haven't changed as much as I had thought. My heart is still mostly what it was. I still base my happiness on what others think of me and focus on all the negatives that I perceive. I still base my self-image on what I can or can't do and it kills me because it's never enough...it's never going to be enough.

I was proud of a change that had I had not accomplished and that has not been completed yet. Maybe that's why God let the other meetings be canceled, because He wanted me to be reminded of my dependence on Him in my heart and not just my head. Whatever the case, I am happy that I went through this weekend. It's good sometimes to be reminded just how easily we can become our own biggest enemies and roadblocks.