Hope, Healing & Freedom Podcast: Episode 163
TRANSCRIPT
Many of us only remember the story of Little Orphan Annie from the history books or from the old black-and-white movie starring Shirley Temple. Annie was a little orphan girl adopted by a very mean woman and her very loving husband, Daddy Warbucks. When Daddy Warbucks traveled on business, which he regularly did, Annie lived in fear and anxiety that the mean Mrs. Warbucks would send her back to the orphanage where she was mistreated. So, what did little orphan Annie learn to do? She learned to perform to earn her acceptance from Mrs. Warbucks. Annie lived out of the stronghold that we will look at today, of Orphan Lifestyle, Performance, and Anxiety.
Thank you for joining in today to learn more about how the Orphan Lifestyle, Performance and Anxiety are strongholds that keep you in bondage. This is Cindi Whitman with Restoring the Foundations International.
PERFORMANCE
Performance is often developed in our childhood or inherited from our family line. When we operate out of performance, we are constantly trying to gain acceptance, affirmation, and love from others for performing well. When we live with this mindset, we expect others to perform to earn our love, affirmation, and acceptance. Our expectations may be unrealistic and unspoken.
Families often have rules to live by, and many times these are unwritten rules. For example, it is not uncommon for one of the family rules to be something like “Don’t make Mom or Dad angry”. Another widespread unwritten rule is “do not embarrass the family”. At home, people can act one way, but when out in public, they must not do anything that would reflect poorly on the family.
Sherry grew up in a home with parents who were very focused on performance. Sherry’s older sister, Carole, was brilliant and often received straight “A” s in school. Not only was she academically gifted, but she was also athletically gifted. She was always chosen first for every playground team, and later in life was often the captain of the team, where she excelled. Carole graduated with a full scholarship to her desired college. Carole and Sherry’s parents were constantly praising Carole. They continually bragged about her academic and athletic performance to their friends. They expressed their love and acceptance of Carole’s performance regularly. Sherry was a hard worker, but lacked the same skill set as Carole.
Sherry went to tutors to help her with her schoolwork. Sherry was more interested in art and drama than athletics. Since her parents had both been star athletes, they didn’t value art and drama as they did athletics and academics. Sherry felt that she was never good enough. She believed her value was in what she did and not who she was. She not only believed that in her life, but she also transferred her feelings and beliefs to her relationship with Father God. She believed that God only loved her when she was perfect. She thought that if others knew who she was, they wouldn’t like her, and they would reject her. Sherry tried to be perfect in everything, but she just fell short. She was constantly striving to earn love and acceptance from Father God but living from the orphan lifestyle mindset and feeling like she had to perform, she didn’t grasp that she already had his love and acceptance.
Carole and Sherry’s parents didn’t intend to communicate to their girls that they only loved them when they won first place or when they excelled in sports. Interestingly, even though Carole had received many accolades and awards, she also struggled with believing that God only loved her when she performed well. Their experience was different, but the outcome was the same. They both tried to earn acceptance and love through their performance.
We see repeatedly in the Bible that God loves people as they are. In the Old Testament, David made the very famous sexual mistake with Bathsheba, then tried to cover up his sin by having her husband killed, yet God called him a “man after his own heart.” Gideon was hiding in a winepress, and God called him “a mighty warrior”. The woman at the well was known by all the town as a sinner and rejected by them, but her encounter with Jesus radically changed her life. He loved her and accepted her first, and then said, “Go and sin no more”. He knew her sin was negatively affecting her life, but his love, acceptance, and forgiveness was given freely and not based on her actions. This is the unconditional love of God, a love that we can always rely on, no matter what.
We hide our shame, and we learn to perform like orphans to get the acceptance of others. We put up walls and pretend that everything is perfect. You might relate to this story.
A family lived almost an hour away from the church they attended. The Dad was on the Church Board and taught an adult Sunday School class. The Mom sang in the church choir. The family was well known in the church. Each Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night, the family drove to the church. Often, during the drive, it was stressful. Either the parents were arguing with each other, or they were yelling at the children. It was almost always a stressful ride to and from church. However, when the family exited the car at the church, “happy faces” were put on, and they looked like the “perfect Christian family,” greeting other churchgoers with smiles. A message that the children learned loud and clear was how important it was to appear, or to perform, like they were a wonderfully perfect family. One of the messages was that above all, “what will people think.”
The next story I am telling is about myself. One of the messages I learned growing up is that ‘If people knew the real me, they would reject me’ or ‘I have to perform to get others’ acceptance.’ When I look back at this situation, I realize how crazy it sounds.
We were having a small group come over to our house for a gathering. At the time, our three children were young and very active. Every day was quite busy and often unpredictable. A week or so before the event, I purchased a couple of flats of flowers to plant by the front entrance. I hadn’t had time to plant them, and they were still sitting in the flats looking rather sickly. I realized the next day that the people were coming over, and I knew how busy my day was going to be. I would not have time to plant those flowers. So, after I bathed the children and put them to bed, I decided to plant the flowers. By the time I cleaned up the kitchen from dinner, folded the laundry and put it away, and did everything else on my list, it was 10:30 pm. So, I went outside with my flashlight and planted the flowers. Why would I do that? The belief that others would think badly of me if they saw that I wasn’t perfect was bondage.
Having a perfect house, with a perfect lawn, and an ideal family was of utmost importance. I expected myself to be perfect, and I put my expectations of perfection on our children and on Lee. Years later, after going through the RTF ministry, I asked our children and Lee to forgive me for the unrealistic expectations that I put on them. My bondage of performance and perfectionism had greatly impacted each of them. I now experience much more freedom! I’ve even had people over to my house when there are dishes in the sink and laundry waiting! I really had a good laugh at myself the day I realized that the neighbors across the street probably thought I was crazy planting flowers by flashlight at 10:30 at night!
This specific incident when I felt this way affected my relationship with God. But as I grew in my faith, I came to understand that God’s love is not based on my performance, but on His grace and mercy.
The next area I want to mention is anxiety. Anxiety comes in many forms and can be a simple anxiety that keeps you from sleeping or a debilitating factor that keeps you from functioning and enjoying life in its fullness.
ANXIETY
Philippians 4:6 “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything; tell God your needs, and don’t forget to thank him for his answers.” Another translation says, “don’t be anxious about anything”. Striving creates anxiety. What if I don’t measure up? What if I can’t meet others’ expectations? What if they see that I’m not perfect? Just like me planting the flowers by flashlight, I was anxious about people seeing that I was not perfect. I was anxious about what people would think of me, so I had to perform by planting the flowers to avoid being judged negatively. That is a perfect picture of this orphan, performance, and anxiety stronghold.
We tend to live for God (strive, perform) rather than FROM Him because we are rooted in an orphan lifestyle rather than in sonship. As we mentioned in a previous podcast, you can’t cast out an orphan heart. An orphan heart must be displaced or replaced by a heart of sonship.
As a reminder from the previous podcast, here are a few of the characteristics of an orphan lifestyle.
- You feel like there is only so much to go around, so if others get some, then there is less for me.
- You can’t rejoice when others prosper because it is taking something away from me.
- You struggle to ask others for help.
- You are independent and self-reliant.
- You view God as Master and yourself as a slave.
- You seek the praise of man, which leads to striving and anxiety.
- You are motivated by a need for personal achievement, which leads to performance.
- You are constantly comparing yourself to others.
- You lack identity, which makes it hard for you to find your place in life.
- You feel like you must be holy. Orphans are driven by increasing condemnation and shame. I should have known better, or I should have done more.
- Your motivation behind Christian disciplines is duty and obligation.
- You constantly compare yourself to others, which is a form of self-rejection.
- You feel that God is like their earthly parents.
When you’re operating out of Orphan Lifestyle, you do things from a place of “ought to” or “should”. When you live as a son or a daughter, you “GET TO”.
ROMANS 8:15-17
5 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear (and anxiety) again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings so that we may also share in his glory.
This is a powerful passage. It takes orphans and makes them into sons and daughters of Father God. Notice what it says. The orphan feels like a slave that has to perform to receive. The Spirit of Sonship is not enslaving but instead adopts you into the family of God as a child of Abba Father. As an adopted child, we have all the rights and privileges of God’s own Son, Jesus. That is why this verse can call us co-heirs with Christ. We are equal heirs with Jesus to all that is in the Kingdom of God. When a child is physically adopted, the parents choose the child. Our Heavenly Father chooses us. I heard a person say once, “God only took me because I prayed the right prayer.” That is not the picture that this verse draws. This verse very clearly says that God chose us and sent His Son, Jesus, to the cross so that we might become His Children.
Ephesians 1:3-7 “Praise be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, whoBLESSED USin the heavenly realm with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he CHOSE us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight, in love he predestined us for ADOPTION TO SONSHIP through Jesus Christ(the Greek word for adoption is sonship referring to FULL LEGAL STANDING of an adopted person), in accordance with his pleasure and will to praise of his glorious grace which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In Him we have REDEMPTION THROUGH HIS BLOOD, the forgiveness of sins…”
An orphan, performance-driven person filled with anxiety looks like this:
You DO… To HAVE… TO BECOME. You’re love-deficient and often insecure.
A Son or Daughter knows that they already have approval, they have love, they have acceptance, they have value, and forgiveness is received. Nothing is based on performance. The Father’s love is unconditional. Vs 11 says, “In him we were also CHOSENand predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything.”
Think about these truths that every orphan seeks.
- As a child of God, we are in a new, forever family.
- We have an eternal, loving Father, who wants us to call Him Abba, “Daddy” Father.
- We have a wonderful big brother in Jesus, who will never leave us or forsake us.
- We have a new family because other believers become our spiritual brothers and sisters, giving us a global family.
- We have the promise of an eternal home in heaven. Jesus is right now preparing a place for us. We will never again be homeless.
- We have the promise of an imperishable inheritance in heaven with God.
- We have spiritual gifts to serve and strengthen our brothers and sisters, giving us purpose.
- We are secure in our family because nothing can separate us from the love of God.
PRAYER
Father God, thank you for loving us the way that we are, but loving us too much to leave us the way that we are. You accept and love us, just like you did the woman at the well, but you desire for us to live free from the things that hold us back. Please help us to embrace the truth that we are your children. We are sons or daughters, and we have all of the privileges of a son or daughter. We don’t have to earn anything; it is already ours. Thank you for your love, acceptance, and forgiveness. Thank you for sending your Son, Jesus Christ, to die for us that we might live freely as your children and experience the abundant life!
Thank you for joining us today for this Hope Healing and Freedom podcast. If you are struggling and need help in finding freedom we encourage you to go to our website restoringthefoundations.org and find a minister that can help you experience this abundant life!