Episode 787 Living the Imperfectly Perfect
[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: [00:00:00] Thanks for joining me on episode 787 of the inspired stewardship podcast.
[00:00:06]Hey friends. My name is Dr. Gary Johnson and I serve as the executive director of effect of elders. I challenge you to invest in yourself. In others and develop your influence while impacting the world by using your time, your talent, your treasures, to live out your calling, having the ability to grow yourself through self-leadership is key.
[00:00:32] And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott Mader.
[00:00:42]God is calling for us in this time to do a lot more listening and a lot less judging to do a lot less looking at each other and saying how one side or the other is wrong and recognize that we're all imperfect beings trying to get to a good [00:01:00] place. And doing a really bad job of getting there right down.
[00:01:05] Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence.
[00:01:28] So that you can impact the world.
[00:01:31]And today's spiritual foundation episode about developing your influence. I talk with you about why we are called to move forwards towards perfection. Not actually to be perfect. I share why our imperfection is part of what makes us real. And I also share how you can recognize the spirit of perfection and use it to help you be more comfortable in your own imperfections.
[00:01:54] So this Friday, I've got an interview on another podcast coming out. I was [00:02:00] honored to appear on the broken Catholic podcast and Joseph over there asked me a lot of questions about my own spiritual journey and where I've come from and what I did and what I've struggled with when it comes to theology.
[00:02:14] And I'll go back once it's released on Friday and put a link to that. Episode in the show notes here as well. So you can go listen to it. But one of the things that we talked about is this idea of being imperfectly. Perfect. About the idea that we oftentimes think of ourselves as needing to be perfect.
[00:02:35] It's one of the places where imposter syndrome comes from it's one of the places where a lot of fear of failure comes from it's one of the places where a lot of different prideful things come from because out of pride, we believe in our own perfection. And yet as believers, we recognize our should recognize that the only truly perfect being is God [00:03:00] and in a way, by holding ourselves up as trying to be perfect, we're trying to take away that power of God.
[00:03:07] And I would argue that in truth, we are never been called to perfect. We are never being called to be perfect. Instead we are being called to move towards perfection. But never to reach there. It's a destination that we don't reach. I've talked about this before on the podcast.
[00:03:27] Instead, it's a journey that we take and this idea is recognizing then that part of what makes us real part of what makes us authentic. Part of what makes us able to reach others is our imperfection. When you think about developing your influence, it's only out of our imperfections, that true influence is reached.
[00:03:52] It. It's only when other people recognize that we're flawed and we're broken. And we share some of those things [00:04:00] together that we can begin to actually have a conversation that is healthy and that works. It's only out of imperfection. That influence comes because it's part of what makes us real and makes us human.
[00:04:17] And the truth is, as you recognize that, as you come to understand that you will get more and more comfortable with it, then you begin to recognize that out of That is where our comfort comes with our own imperfection and don't get me wrong. This is not something that I would say is easy. This is not something that comes quickly being comfortable with your own imperfection and yet continuing to strive to get better.
[00:04:44] It's this weird dichotomy it's living in what I call the both and this idea of. You can be content with where you're at and yet try to get more, you can be accepting of your own faults and yet work to overcome them. And you can be [00:05:00] accepting of the faults of others without necessarily looking at it and believing it or believing that all truth is relative or that everyone is right or anything else you can reach a balance and have a dialogue with people, even people that you disagree with.
[00:05:16] If you recognize that we're all broken and imperfect vessels and that only God is truly perfect only God can really reach all of us. And when you recognize that. Then you begin to be able to hold each other up in love without judgment. And that's a really hard thing to do, especially right now in the times that we live in.
[00:05:42] I don't know about you, but I've been doing a lot of doom scrolling where you sit there and look through Facebook or Twitter or whatever. And I'm getting upset because there's people that I love and I trust. Who don't see things in a way that I feel is right and godly and Christian. And in fact, [00:06:00] they hold up their views as the correct godly Christian views.
[00:06:05] And yet I don't see it. And what I'm sure is true is if I was to express my views on Facebook, they would feel the same way about me. And I'll be honest, I think. That God is calling for us in this time to do a lot more listening and a lot less judging to do a lot less looking at each other and saying how one side or the other is wrong and recognize that we're all imperfect beings trying to get to a good place and doing a really bad job of getting there right now.
[00:06:41] And maybe out of that, some peace and some healing can come. Thanks for listening.
[00:06:48]Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast as a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but [00:07:00] act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoy this episode, do me a favor, go over to facebook.com/inspired stewardship and like our Facebook page and market that you'd like to get notifications from us so that we can connect with you on Facebook and make sure that we're serving you to the best of our abilities with time and tips there.
[00:07:31] Until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures. Develop your influence and impact the world.