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This hits home with me because I think that God has taken me on a journey to deal with one of my worse fears......making mistakes. This may sound odd to you but if you understood my background, you will understand why I always feel that whether I am having financial dealings, or dealings in relationships or in everything in life, I feel I have to make the right choice or else. And I think God has been letting me go through this thing where I do my best to make the right decision with the knowledge I had at the time but then later stuff happens, things change and I found I made a mistake.
When I was growing up, I had an EXTREMELY tense home environment. I was the one and only support for my younger siblings and whenever they came to me for answer, I always had to have the right answer or give them the right direction. There was absolutely no room for mistakes. If I screwed up, there were severe consequences and someone could get very hurt if I didn't give the right advice. I always felt that I had to be the fearless leader who had all the answers.
The Israeli Defense Force has probably the best military training in the world. And there is a reason for this, because when they are training their soldiers they actually use REAL bullets. That is what my home environment felt like and it was not a pretty or happy or relaxed place to be. And I carried this behavior into my adulthood and have always felt that I have to be perfect in all my decision making or else.
And it doesn't help that I grew up with a theology in my head where I was told that when I pray for direction, I had better be hearing and sensing right. Because if I make a mistake and choose something wrong or by accident, it's over for me. Once I am off track, it is forever and there are no second chances. But I am beginning to see that this way of thinking isn't right and it actually is very damaging.
In my life, I have actually met people who were so afraid of falling out of God's will that they would rather depend on some kind of leader or guru to make decisions or tell them what they are hearing because they are afraid to be wrong. It's not a fun way to live nor is there freedom or liberation with that kind of belief system.
I am now starting to see that God knows all my mistakes before I make them. I used to beat myself up or get frustrated if I made a decision without knowing all the facts or if someone didn't come through for me like i expected or was needing them too. In the story of "The Silver Chair", the kids had 4 signs they were supposed to follow and screwed up 3 of them. But they did end up getting the job done and that was all that counted.
When I worked at call centres, there wasn't a day that went by that I didn't have to fix someone else's bill that had gotten screwed up. And I realize now that if a human being like me is capable of fixing up a bill, then an all powerful God is completely capable of fixing up areas where I have made wrong decisions or even got myself into sticky situations where I walked into them believing things would turn out a certain way only to have everything change. None of the mistakes in my life that I will ever make are a surprise to God and when I pray, I already feel a sweet and gentle whisper telling me "I got you covered, don't worry".
Having this revelation in my heart gives me a sense of peace and I can seriously take comfort in knowing that I can just do the best that I can do and if there are unseen contingencies, he's already got a plan to fix the problem even before I had the problem. There is nothing that I am going through that he hasn't allowed to happen and if he allows me to get into something, he already has a way planned to get me out of it.
In short.......this fearless leader fears no more!
