A New Year's Confession--I Am Not the Christ

There are times I am tempted to envy our dogs.

They have this wonderful privilege of napping any time they feel like it.

Just curl up in the middle of the day and go to sleep. 

While we wash dishes, milk the goat, strain the milk, mop the floor, feed the dogs, cook meals, package books to send, listen to people's tales of woe, wish delivery men a good day, and a dozen other things.

I got through a very busy Christmas season, complete with a haircutting day for Jonathan's dad, the burial of his mother, another trip with Jonathan to town on New Years Day to take lunch in to Jonathan's father, 

 

(where we heard this robin in a nearby tree singing while Jonathan swept the snow off his dad's driveway),

saying goodbye to my oldest daughter, and being part of a family conference about some important things.

Today I kind of came unraveled.
I was on the tipping point emotionally, and it didn't take much to spill over.  

And then news came that an acquaintance was about to leave this world, due to stage 4 cancer,

and I went to some corner and cried.

I wish I could fix everybody's problems but I can't. 

I am not Christ.

I've been reading in John, and it takes me about three or four days just to get through one chapter. 

One day what struck me was John's confession about Jesus and about himself. 

His confession stated this: "I am not the Christ." 

 John was sent to prepare a way for Christ; he was Christ's forerunner; he pointed to Christ.

But he was not Christ. 

When he confessed something in that situation, John didn't say who he was, but who he was not.

That was his confession.
"John confessed, and denied not, but confessed saying, 'I am not the Christ.'"

Besides saying "Jesus Christ is Lord," it is a good and healthy thing to recognize that we are not Christ, and we are not Lord. 

We are not even little Christs. 

We absolutely have limitations; we can't do or be everything that everybody needs at any given time.

Sometimes we come unraveled.

So instead of making a New Years resolution about doing or being some grand thing, I need to remember this year what and who I am not.

I am not the Christ. 

 I am a simple, very weak human being who happens to be a woman on top of that. 

And I cannot fix things for everyone. Jesus didn't even do that. When He was on this earth He could only be in one place at one time.

What makes me think I can tend my family's needs, and mine, and my husband's and everybody else's as if I am God--

when, in fact I am not?

So this year, much as I would like to be powerful and mighty and all-wise and perfect--

I have to admit that I am not.

I have to confess that I have severe limitations and have to set up boundaries.

Because, simply put,

I am not the Christ.