I had a wobble this morning. The heat and being pregnant just got to me and I was crying in the kitchen before 8am and feeling I had really lost the plot.

You see, I was suddenly overwhelmed with everything that is going on over the next week and just couldn’t cope. I couldn’t manage the fact there was a delivery due today, that there is furniture being delivered to a friend’s flat over the road that I need to collect tomorrow, that our bathroom door is due to be fixed, that I am due back at work next week, that the summer holidays are coming up and we need to get the house organised for our new arrival in September.

It was like a wave hitting me all at once and I felt condemned, as if I was a failure.

A glass of water and a hug from my husband helped, as did him popping back in just after he had left for work for another hug and just to check I was ok.

As I had my shower this morning, I prayed and felt that sweet release of the perfect peace that passes all understanding wash over me and a real sense of calm.

What had happened? Yes, partly hormones, partly heat, partly pregnancy but a lot of it was to do with listening to my fears and anxieties and allowing them to take hold. Hence a rather unhealthy and demoralising response.

So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law

My initial response was to beat myself up about it. To condemn myself for my reaction, to berate myself, to remind myself what a failure I was for my reaction and to feel guilty and as though I had messed up all my progress with God.

Then, I opted for prayer.

It made me think about how easily we fall into the trap of believing the worst about ourselves over little things. How easily that sense of guilt can creep up on us and hold us captive.

This is not the life we are called to, this is not the freedom that was bought for us on the cross.

Freedom – something we all agree is a good thing. Something we all crave and aspire to feel that we have achieved. The issue is, we try to attain it alone and that doesn’t work. It cannot be earned through human effort but it has been earned for us though the work on the cross.

It is finished. It is completed.

I could have let the incident this morning affect my whole day. I could have given up, decided I was too unworthy to blog about faith and the Christian walk when I had so obviously failed. I could have become consumed by negative thoughts and feelings and just remained silent.

But, I didn’t. I was transformed by the renewing of my mind. Remembering that all have sinned and fallen short. Remembering that there is grace for us in our failures. Reminding myself that we are not perfect and that we will have moments of weakness and difficulty but it doesn’t have to consume us.

I chose to listen to the truth rather than the lies. I chose to pick myself up and start again rather than keep dwelling on what had happened.

How did your day begin? Did it have the start you anticipated?
If it did – great.

If it didn’t – who are you listening to right now? Are you in a place of guilt or a place of freedom?

Who are you focussing on? Yourself or the author and finisher of your faith?

There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Be free today.

Free from guilt, free from negative thoughts and emotions, free from lies.

Be free to be you.