I have thought about this question so many times in my life. I even thought of a title for a book; for it was my childhood story "Voices from Inside the Glass House". Being a daughter of a pastor, I felt as if all eyes were on me. From a young age, people noticed if I ran in church, was talking or passed notes to my friends during a service.
My list of rules were longer than my daughter's hair. Some would say, I lived through legalism. For those of you who don't know what legalism is, it is a set of rules created by men as part of a religion. They could be don't go to movies, don't go to dances, don't ever drink alchohol. For some, this will be hard to read and understand. Fear was my guide for living and abiding by the list of rules. Today I understand rules from a different perspective which I will talk about later on, however then all I knew was that if I didn't abide by "all the rules" that I would be a bad reflection on my dad and his place in the church. Was this just my perception, that all eyes were on me? Not hardly! Many people put my dad and everyone who lived under his roof under the same microscope waiting for one of us to make a mistake.
I learned to wear a false sense that everything in my world was perfect, that I never made mistakes and neither did my parents. However, it was so hard to wear the mask and hide behind the phisod, I wanted to break free. I used to have a recurring dream that I was a bird, flying high over the city where I could see everything from very high heights. I was free. I think it was a representation that I truly disliked living a glass house. It wasn't a life that I had chosen, I was born into the glass house on display for all to see. I played the part well. I attended all the wedding showers, baby showers, weddings with my parents, playing the grown up child. Outwardly I followed all the rules and inwardly, I couldn't wait to escape the glass house. My prayer was that God wouldn't make me marry a pastor or missionary to force me to live and raise children back in the glass house.
It started to make me think that God was watching my every move too like every other human being, waiting for me to make one wrong move. If I was a good child, He would love me. If I made a mistake, then I would have to work hard to earn His love and trust back. It took me until I was 35 to accept the fact that I didn't have to do one single thing to earn the love of the Heavenly Father. He loves me unconditionally no matter what I say or do. He isn't mankind, giving bars of performance that I have to reach to gain His love. I don't have to say the right things all the time or follow every single rule perfectly to gain His approval.
In essence I felt that I had to live perfectly to gain approval of man. I learned to live life to please others. I wasn't following the rules out of love and respect for God, I was following the rules out of respect for my family or how we would viewed.
The Bible says there is no one righteous (right with God), no not one. We all have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God. This is so freeing to know and believe that every human being on earth is not perfect. We ALL make mistakes. Whether we are a student, or a teacher, parent or a child, grandparent, young or old, as long as we are breathing, on a daily basis, we will all continue to make mistakes. Having said that, it means that we all need to extend grace to others in their moments of humanness. Not one of us can stand on the outside of the glass house looking in on the life of another and think that we have the right to put their life under a microscope.
Today I read the Bible and there are many commandments that Jesus gave us like Do not Steal, Do not murder, Do not commit adultery. They are not just a list of rules. There are natural consequences to the commands. Some consequences cause us to suffer personally, others do damage to those around us. The rules were not created to keep us from fun, they were for our protection and protection of those around us. These are not rules that I nor my pastor made up, they are God's commandments. I have personally seen the consequences and the lives are destroyed by some choosing to break these commandments. There is still forgiveness even in making mistakes that I have spoken of. God says if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.
I always tell my kids that I will love them no matter what they say or do. Sometimes they challenge that statement, but in the end, regardless of their actions, they are still my child. God feels the same way about us. He knows that we are going to make wrong choices and break His commandments from time to time, yet He still loves me anyways!
God died in our place, gave us grace and mercy for our weaknesses when we didn't deserve it, why are we not able to do the same with others?
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