Maybe nobody was ever supposed to be inspired by me getting it right.
My niece told me recently, “Your walk with Jesus has always been so inspiring to me.”
And my first thought wasn’t thank you. It was shame.
If they knew the whole story, they wouldn’t say that.
I sat with that thought that morning while I was journaling. I caught myself doing what I have done for years — measuring whether I am allowed to be inspiring by whether my story is clean enough. As if inspiration requires a perfect record. As if one wrong chapter, one season I would not read out loud, cancels out everything else.
That is what shame does. It tells you that people are only seeing the edited version of you. It tells you that if they saw the rest, they would change their minds. It tells you that your story disqualifies you.
But this morning I thought — maybe that’s not the point.
Maybe nobody was ever supposed to be inspired by me getting it right.
Maybe the purpose isn’t to be inspired by my actions, but despite my actions. Despite the choices I made when I was faithful to Him, and the choices I made when I wasn’t, my Heavenly Father stayed patient. And kind. And merciful.
Patient when I was slow to learn. Kind when I did not expect kindness. Merciful when I expected judgment.
That is what Psalm 103:10 says, and it has stayed with me ever since:
“He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.”
If God treated us as our sins deserve, none of us would have a story worth telling. Inspiration would be impossible, because none of us have lived a life that earns it. But He does not treat us that way. He treats us according to His mercy, not according to our record.
That changes what inspiration can mean. It means a flawed life can still point to Him — not because the flaws are hidden, but because the mercy is visible in them. People are not seeing a perfect person. They are seeing a patient God holding a very imperfect person through season after season.
He has always been so faithful to me. I can only try to be faithful to Him.
That is not false humility. That is honest accounting. My faithfulness has been inconsistent. His has not. If there is anything inspiring in my walk, it is not that I have always gotten it right. It is that He has stayed, even when I have not.
Maybe that is why Rahab’s story stays with me, too. She was not remembered for a perfect past. She was remembered for faith, and for being part of a lineage she did not earn. Her past was not erased. It simply was not the final word. Mercy did that.
I am not saying our choices do not matter. They do. I still have to own mine. I still have to take responsibility for what I have done, and I still have to try to be faithful going forward. Mercy is not an excuse to stay the same.
But owning your past is not the same as letting your past decide your future. Accountability and mercy can live in the same story. In fact, they have to, or mercy would not mean anything. Mercy only makes sense where there is something to forgive. Patience only shows up where someone stayed.
So I am learning to ask a different question. Not, “Is my story clean enough to inspire anyone?” but, “Is His mercy clear enough in my story for someone else to see it?”
What part of your story have you thought disqualifies you? Possibly that is the very part that shows His mercy most. 💛