The time: let’s just say the 90s. The place: Mrs. Rhodes 2nd grade classroom. Mrs. Rhodes had an awesome way of tracking her students’ good behavior in the classroom — by the envelopes on the wall assigned to each student. If you were bad, you got a raincloud. But if you were good, you got a beautiful, sunny rainbow in the envelope by your name

I don’t remember everything about second grade, but I somehow still remember those rainbows. Something about the desire to do good and the desire for approval and affirmation from my teacher was so real that I still can recall the feeling of yearning for that token of good behavior to this day. Oh how proud and accepted you felt when that sunny rainbow was put right into your envelope.

We are a works-based society and culture, and that has taught us a lot of works-based habits and ideals. This in turn spreads over into our relationships, our self-image, and our communication with God.

We desire so badly to get the rainbow. We work so hard to achieve it and set our self-esteem, our self-worth, and our self-respect upon the shoulders of its achievement. We are so quickly validated by the attainment of it, and our spirits even swifter to be demolished when it falls through our grasp.

One of the latest trendy sayings is the phrase “the struggle is real” — if I’ve heard it once lately, I’ve heard it 1,000 times among the teens I’m around every week. It is a satirical statement that you can put at the end of any comment about something that is difficult, or ironically, something that is not difficult. It’s hilarious to use when you’re being sarcastic or making fun of yourself for having first-world-problems. For example, a pretty joking usage of it would be: “I ran out of milk for my Cocoa Puffs today. The struggle is real.” [I may or may not have actually said this lately…] 

There are plenty of struggles that aren’t real and funny to make jokes about, but there’s a struggle that IS real, and that is the conflict of accepting ourselves and believing God accepts us through our works.  This is a true battle fought in hearts and minds the world over, as we struggle between the patterns of thought we’ve learned through our culture, and the deeper truths of love and grace that the Word ministers to our parched souls.

Ephesians 2:8-9 reads “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

The Message paraphrase of this verse says “Saving [you and me] is all his idea, and all His work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.”

You did good, so you feel good about yourself. You did bad, you feel bad about yourself.  You fluctuate up and down, down and up, your relationships with others, self-image, and communication with God all resting on the perilous frailty of your works. This is not how we are to live, this is not how we are to view love. Isaiah 64:6 says “all our righteousness are as filthy rags.” They do not reflect your worth or your acceptance by God. Romans 5:8 says “God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

God’s love is unconditional, strong, and valiant — the opposite of the weak, imperfect, and failing love of the world. Our lives should reflect GOD’S way of looking at our works and not the world’s. They should reflect GOD’S way of loving ourselves and others than the world’s way. We can accept ourselves and others not based on what we DO, but on the value God placed on us just because He loves us and we are His children.

Don’t get me wrong. Works are very important. Matthew 5:16 says “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven.” Good works are a calling card to the unsaved, they are a witness and testimony of the faith we have on the inside. I do not want to diminish the weight of their meaning in any way — they are very important. They are just not the most important. They are vital to our Christian walk, just not vital to your worth and great price.

Sometimes we don’t do all the good works we should do as Christians living for the Lord. Sometimes we don’t spend all the time with God we should spend. Sometimes we don’t always obey the Word the way we know we need to obey it. Sometimes we don’t…..[you fill in the blank]…!!!

The condemnation that can come on you when you give in to feelings of inadequacy about the things you don’t do right can be absolutely demoralizing to your faith–because they take your focus away from one very important thing — God’s mercy. This whole life as a Christian is not about you, it’s about God. It’s not about your mistakes, it’s about God’s grace. It’s not about what you can do when you’re good, or what you didn’t or can’t do when you’re bad. It’s about what God is and can do through you regardless of if you’re the best at something or the worst.

Let me tell you something right now. God accepts you. Not only that, He approves of you. He loves you. Sometimes, we can become so works-oriented solely based on the desire to be accepted and approved, thinking that it’s good works that can accomplish unconditional love for us. But that’s the thing about unconditional love — there are no conditions.

When Luke told the story of Mary and Martha, and wrote that beautiful exchange between Jesus and these sisters, he penned a line of truth that can stand with us in all our battles against works. “ONE THING is needful,” and it wasn’t the many works that make us feel good and accomplished. It is the relationship with God where we are seated at His feet receiving from His heart. It is knowing True Love and receiving based on nothing we have done. It is seeing ourselves through the Blood of Jesus.

Trusting in your works brings fear. But as 1 John 4:18 teaches us, there is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out fear, because fear has torment [aka condemnation]. The condemnation that tries to come when you fail in your “works” can take you back to the feelings of getting the raincloud by your name in second grade, because the tendencies of human nature are still the same. We desire to be validated, celebrated.

The struggle is real, but fight every tendency the world has taught you to justify or condemn yourself based on what you have done, whether you got the rainbow or not. Allow me, if you will, to encourage you with this thought, that you ARE validated and celebrated by your Father God today. But it will never be because you are good enough or pretty enough or perfect enough. It will always be based solely on HIS perfect, unconditional, and fully-approving love based on the blood of Jesus.