Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen

Riddle:  what singular thing can bring us great benefit and massive discouragement?  Well, it's all in the semantics.  Great benefit:  emulating a person and family you admire, otherwise known as role modeling.  Massive discouragement:  comparing yourself to a person or family you envy, otherwise known as idol worshipping.

My husband and I had a discussion about this last night over burgers and fries at Newts.  I wanted to pick his brain on which men in his life he admires and seeks to emulate.  He wanted to eat his burger and keep abreast of the 49ers/Patriots score.  But he humored me and mentioned a couple of names, pointed to some parenting classes we've taken, and praised the fact that we are a tight team when it comes to guiding our family. 

"Do you ever get down on yourself because you're not more like so-and-so?" I probed. 

"Nope."

"Oh." 

Maybe it's a female thing.  Maybe we more easily turn role models into idols.  All I know is that I have to be extremely careful in this area.  In the Bible, which is my instruction manual, there is no step-by-step recipe on how to do life and raise a family.  God has provided the ingredients of my family in one big, handsome face, one quickly-wrinkling, almost 40-year-old mug,  and 3 sweet, ever-morphing faces.  He says, "Child, this is My provision for you.  There are a million fine ways cook.  Just trust Me, and I will be your guide and soothe your worries." 

What happens when there are too many cooks in my mental kitchen?  

It leads me to think things like: why don't  I have her ingredients?  How come I can't have a kitchen like theirs?  How do they cook with a well-developed recipe, while I just cook with a pinch of this and a palm of that?  How did they get nice, brown bread while mine is burned on the bottom? 

Suddenly, my mind hits fast-forward through the Food Network.  Do it like this!  Do it like that!  Stir the pan!  Put on the lid!  Take off the lid!  Turn up the heat!  No, turn it down!  Follow the recipe!  Throw out the recipe!  Oh, look at his perfect turkey.  Oh, look at her beautiful cake.

Stop.  STOP!  Turn it off.  We are the Pearsons.  God loves even the worst things about us, because they keep us humble and seeking Him.  God loves the best things about us because they make Him look good. 

Now, I think I'll go join my family for our own little breakfast in our own little kitchen, even if someone burns the toast.