Rethinking "What will they think?"

So it is incredibly hard to put yourself out there.  I am constantly wanting approval from other people that I am doing the right thing or that they (go figure) approve.  So why isn't it enough that God loves me?  Why does this human side get to me and throw me for a loop?  This is one of the lessons I am learning each day.  It doesn't matter what other people think!  We're all human so at some point our opinions are faulty anyway.  Why take something faulty as truth?

I don't want Reagan to grow up worrying about other people like I do.  I will say, I am much better at this since having a child but there are those moments of being judged as a "bad mom."  (For instance, when Reagan went head first out of the shopping cart - talk about your mom guilt!!)  If I could spare her some of the lessons I had to learn the hard way, we'd be good to go.  I realize, though, that I can't make her do anything as she gets older.  I can show her my example and try to teach her, but ultimately she'll be a decision making adult.  This is precisely why I need to let go of what other's think and embrace God's love more than I ever have.  If she sees this in me, it is more likely that she won't have those hard lessons later.

Here's another link to a Kim Walker song, How He Loves Us.  It is really amazing!!  The descriptions she gives are unlike anything I've heard before.  "He is jealous for me - loves like a hurricane  - I am a tree - bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy."  It doesn't get better than that.  I think she captures the force with which God loves us!

So today, I surrender again...embracing the love of God that will wash over me no matter what anyone else thinks!  Isn't that what matters?