pedestal

this topic came up in conversation with a friend earlier this week, and has been brewing in my mind for days. i'm still not sure where this is going, but that's part of the fun of writing - i usually don't have much of an idea of what's going to come out of these fingertips until i see the words on the screen - it's amazing to me that any of my posts are anywhere near coherent thoughts.

so i'm stuck on this idea of pedestals - putting people on them, to be more precise. actually, now that i think about it, this idea has come up in conversation several times over the past week... i had a great chance to catch up with my niece last saturday, which involved a conversation that lasted several hours. in case you don't know, she is 17, and the only way to keep a 17-year-old actively engaged in conversation for any length of time is to revolve said conversation around them - their lives, their hopes, dreams, fears, anxieties, plans, pouts, etc... during the course of that conversation, she told me that for most of her life, she had kept me on a pedestal - that in her eyes, not only could i do no wrong (rriiiigghhtt) but that everything i did, i did perfectly... my reaction? now that i'm off the pedestal, maybe we can actually have a real relationship, because now i'm a real person in her eyes.

a few days later, a friend and i were discussing the lack of development in a friendship that i felt had enough depth and intimacy to have trust and breadth, as well. my fear was that this "friend" was put off by my directness and transparency, and i was unsure how to overcome that. as it turns out, this was not the case at all. instead of being turned away by my directness and transparency, this person had me on a bit of a pedestal, which i promptly fell off of over the past summer when life got hard for me. you see, she admired my strength and passion for the Lord, and as i faltered, she became disillusioned, not only with my faith, but her own, as well... that might be one of the scariest thoughts i've had in awhile.

please don't read condemnation here. i'm guilty of this, as well. it's very easy to put people who occupy places of authority or admiration in our lives on pedestals. this can happen with our bosses, our friends, favorite authors, speakers, even our leadership... and it's such a devastating place to be. what we have to realize is that the people we admire are simply that - people. they make mistakes, go through hard times, lack grace, mis-communicate, fail, fall, fart in the bathtub...

i learned about pedestals several years ago when i first came to the ring. i had very little understanding of boundaries (mine and other people's), no idea as to what putting a person on a pedestal did to them, nor to myself. a good friend of mine gently pointed out that i had inadvertently put our pastor on a pedestal, with all the resulting improper expectations, lack of grace, and imbalanced (self-focused) perspective... and i am so grateful for that lesson - that insight spoken so gently into my life.

the biggest problem with pedestals, in my opinion, is not so much that the person will fall off - and they will - the biggest problem is that when we idolize someone in our life, we take our focus off Jesus. we begin to care more about what they think than asking Jesus what He thinks. we begin to think about that person more than we think about the Lord. we end up making that person an idol in our life, and that is so unfair to the person being idolized. this can happen with just about anyone in our lives - our parents, our family, our spouse, our friends, our leadership... and it dishonors God. yeah, ouch.

but probing more deeply into our tendency to idolize others, a much more devastating problem is uncovered. we tend to idolize others when we see something in them that we "lack" in ourselves, and that lack results in, or is a result of, shame. you may be thinking that i've made quite a leap from pedestals to idols to shame. i'm not so sure:

Shame enters in and makes its crippling home deep within our hearts. Shame is what makes us look away, so we avoid eye contact with strangers and friends. Shame is that feeling that haunts us, the sense that if someone really knew us, they would shake their heads in disgust and run away. Shame makes us feel, know, believe, that we do not measure up - not to the world's standards, the church's standards, or our own.

Others seem to master their lives, but shame grips our hearts and pins them down, ever ready to point out our failures and judge our worth. We are lacking. We know we are not all that we long to be, all that God longs for us to be, but instead of coming up for grace-filled air and asking God what He thinks of us, shame keeps us pinned down and gasping, believing that we deserve to suffocate. If we were not deemed worthy of love as children, it is incredibly difficult to believe we are worth loving as adults. Shame says we are unworthy, broken and beyond repair.

Shame causes us to hide. We are afraid of being truly seen, and so we hide our truest selves and offer only what we believe is wanted. If we are a dominating kind of woman [or man], we offer our "expertise". If we are a desolate kind of woman [or man], we offer our "service." We are silent and do not say what we see or know when it is different from what others are saying, because we think we must be wrong. We refuse to bring the weight of our lives, who God has made us to be, to bear on others out of a fear of being rejected. -- Captivating, pp 73-74

shame says that we are not enough, or that we are too much. it causes us to look to others for validation, to prove our worth... and the only place to look for these things is the Word of God - Christ Himself. and let me just tell you - He adores you. He loves you. He accepts you. He is the One who validates you, who gives your life worth and meaning - no one or nothing else can do that for you.

i can also tell you that it breaks His heart when we seek others before Him. how do i know this to be true? just a brief overview of the old testament reveals this to us. how many times did israel turn away from the LORD, and how many times did He make a way for them to return to Him? bringing that truth forward into our lives this side of the cross, all we have to do is look into our own lives, our own walks with Jesus, to see that this is true. He is constantly seeking us, wanting time and intimacy with us, drawing us to Himself. what do you think motivates Him to keep after us, after all the repeated rejection and attempts at self-sufficiency? love. His love for His kids. His desire for relationship, for fellowship, for true intimacy with us... there will never be anyone in our lives that can or will love us that way - pure, unconditional, agape love is ONLY from the Lord.

putting people on pedestals - idolizing them - breaks His heart. He is the only One deserving of so much focus, so much emotion, so much effort and energy. as if that weren't bad enough, the one that we idolize is hurt, as well. let's look at it from the other side - what are we supposed to do when we realize that we have become the object of someones worship? ouch. now we're getting into sticky territory. i can only write from my own experiences. in the case of my niece, all i could do was to live my life in an exemplary manner around her, and wait for the day that she busted me being me. in the case of my friend, i can only wait and pray while i live my life walking with Jesus - valleys, deserts, peaks and all. in other words, i can only be me - it's the fairest expectation and the only one i will allow to dictate my actions. i have to put boundaries in place, and live within those boundaries, enforcing them when necessary - all the while being cognizant of other's boundaries, as well, and respecting them at all costs.

so where does shame fit into this? we have to realize that shame is a huge motivating factor in all our lives. we have to see it for what it is, and the influence it has over our lives... and we have to renounce the lies that it brings with it. shame is not of the Lord. it is a lie from the pit of hell. the sooner we realize that, the sooner we begin to recognize where it has permeated our lives and ask Jesus to reveal His heart to us. when He does that, we will begin to see our lives and each other through His eyes and the idol worship will stop. grace will reign in our lives again. our vertical will be restored, and our horizontals will fall back into place, where they belong.