My Burdens are Self-Imposed

In the same way that God ultimately deserves the glory for all of "my" accomplishments, He also has freed me of the responsibility to perform. I don't have to paddle up stream in my ministry, I just have to turn it over to God and release myself from unrealistic expectations of how much I must achieve. It is stressful to give myself credit for the good works I have done because the logical conclusion I will bring myself to is that I am also to blame for thebad deeds and the good works that have gone undone. Though I know that there is an extent to which I am responsible for my choices and deeds, I have not been called to live a life defined by remorse and guilt.

I think I probably need to try less and just be. The whole problem here seems to be that I have not fully relinquished control of myself to Him. If I had then I wouldn't find myself repeatedly encountering the same struggles and succumbing. I wouldn't have to try so hard to maintain self-control, because He would already be in control. If I could just BE in Christ then the striving, the kind of striving that comes out of myself and depletes me when I am already low, would be unnecessary. Since Christ is already in me, and I in Him, then I already am the real deal. Why am I still performing the role of Christian when that is my ACTUAL identity? And though that is my identity, why do I find myself still driving up-hill using my own makeshift fuel - which I have formed using the clothes off of my own back and the food off of my own plate - when I have an unlimited supply of God's premium grade fuel within reach???

I'm especially frustrated because I know that my exhaustion, my less-than-Christ-like behavior at work, my burdens, are self-imposed. He's already offered to carry them, and I think He already is. I've just gotten so used to having a pack on my back that now my body has to re-learn how to walk upright. I'm carrying a phantom back-pack and the very expectation of its presence is so heavy that I cannot run.

LORD JESUS CHRIST HAVE MERCY ON ME, KAREN, A SINNER........