An exhortation to mothers on guarding our hearts and minds from the sin of self-pity
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Homemaking and motherhood are hard. There are days and even seasons when the monotony can feel palpable as we change one more diaper, wash one more dish, and prepare one more meal. “Does anyone in this house notice my hard work? Appreciate it? A thank you would be nice.” Before we know it, a woe-is-me, victim mindset takes hold and, voilà, we’ve fallen into the Pity Party Pit.
“Well, wait one minute,” our flesh says. “Surely my feelings are justified. I’ve been in prayer over this. I’ve been crying to the Lord for help. He’s seen how unappreciated my work is; how hard I’ve been trying to serve my family; to honor Him. If there is any sin happening, it’s sin being done to me, not by me.”
Hit the pause button
Let’s pause here.
These are all understandable feelings, but are they right thinking? As Christian women living in a world saturated with self-care mantras, we can’t let ourselves be shaped by them. We need to fill our minds with the truth of God’s Word so we aren’t tossed to and fro on the world’s waves of self-help philosophy. Right thinking means knowing what God says about our hardships and struggles and how He commands us to deal with them.
We are called to take all thoughts captive to Christ, to walk in the Spirit and not the flesh, and to be content in all circumstances… and that means all.
Yikes! That’s a tall order. Or is it? Does our loving Father give us commands without also giving us the grace to obey? Christ Himself tells His disciples in John 14:15-18a:
“If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever – the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans…”
Do you want to hear something encouraging? This is just one of over 7,000 precious promises found in Scripture that God has for us to lay hold of. When we realize that many of these promises are accessible now, we can encourage our hearts and minds to walk according to our new nature and not be dragged down by the old man who has been crucified with Christ. Life, and life abundant, is what Christ has made available to us; and He has given us every tool to make a life abundant a reality.
With that, we can confidently declare that self-pity has no place in our new nature, including no place in our homemaking or motherhood. Knowing this, let’s replace the lies we’ve been telling ourselves with God’s Word, which is a “lamp unto [our] feet and a light unto [our] path” and lay hold of the rope that pulls us out of this pit…
He lets us see it coming
We serve a loving and kind God. In fact, the Lord is so kind in His dealings with us, that He gives us ample opportunity to see sin coming and put into practice our new nature and gifts found in Christ. Let’s take a look at how James lays out the process of how our sin is actually birthed:
“But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.” (James 1:14-15, NKJV)
If we read this Scripture carefully, we can see that the road to actual sin is a process. James explains that this process starts with our own desires enticing us. So, if we find ourselves in the Pity Party Pit, we can know that we have an unmet desire. The sin of self-pity typically is the result of multiple sinful thoughts about unmet desires that have not been confessed, repented of, or corrected. Rather, they’ve been stewed upon or vented in an ungodly way.
For me, my secret desire (that is often unmet, being the mother of four small children) is control. When I lose control, I begin to stew on my frustrations. The stewing makes it very easy for me to fall into the Pity Party Pit, especially when I continue down this path of sin by validating my ungodly feelings rather than confessing them.
Let me set the scene. It usually goes something like this…
I have a great day planned for the family. I’ve taken every measure to prepare all meals and activities the night before. Stress-free and the livin’s easy! Spur-of-the-moment play-date planning? Check!
Carpe diem!
We all sit down to breakfast with our Bible open, ready to honor Christ as living sacrifices.
“I hate eggs,” says my three-year-old.
“Okay,” I think to myself. “He’s three. Correct and overlook the offense.”
Then the two oldest start arguing over animal facts from the last Wild Kratts episode we watched while my three-year-old continues to pout about the eggs. Before I can gather my next thought, I hear my 9-month-old crying, only to find him in his crib rolling around in a blown-out diaper.
“Honey! Can you make me coffee?” shouts my husband from downstairs.
[Insert short-circuit sound]
My brain goes into over-stimulation overload and I feel the mom-lecture coming on.
“You can stop now, Brianna,” I tell myself. “Stop now and redirect this in a godly way.”
In my flesh, I decide that’s a hard no – and I burst.
I unleash my unrighteous anger (which I call righteous anger in the moment of course) on anyone within earshot. I speak in a tone unbecoming of a Christian woman, let alone a Christian mother, and decide to spray everyone around me in a shower of sin disguised as godly wisdom.
Does this sound familiar?
It’s about this time that I see the Pity Party Pit. Why does it look so inviting? It’s wooing me toward it like the woman Proverbs warns about. Sweet like honey? No – a deadly poison. Instead of taking the path around the Pity Party Pit, straight into the arms of Christ, I jump headlong into it. For a moment it tastes sweet, but I quickly begin to taste the bitterness. Then, almost instantaneously, follow the accusations of the enemy:
“You’re a terrible mother. You really shouldn’t have more children.”
“You were just praying THIS morning about being a more gentle mother, Brianna. You’re hopeless.”
Sound familiar again?
There is a way out
It’s easy to see the process of sin unfold when you write it down on paper, but in the moment it is much more deceitful and difficult to see. This calls for prayer. The Lord is faithful to answer us when we pray according to His will. 1 Corinthians 10:13 says:
“No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” (1 Corinthians 10:13, NKJV)
As we can all see by my own failure described above, the Lord did give me a way out; I just didn’t take it. The enemy also chose to attack me directly after I had fallen into the Pity Party Pit with accusations about my identity. However, herein lies the Achilles’ heel of Satan – and our way out of the pit.
When Christ died on the cross, Colossians 2:15 says:
“Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.”
Furthermore, Romans 8:1 encourages our hearts: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
The devil’s accusations that keep us trapped in the Pity Party Pit have no hold on us. Christ has defeated Satan and all his minions. He has “disarmed them and put them to open shame.” When the devil or our own hearts accuse us, we can confidently declare our identity in Christ, confess our sin, and repent. I highly recommend doing this out loud. I speak the truths of Scripture out loud over myself, my husband, and my children daily. I even do it when I am by myself doing chores. We are:
• Elect (Luke 18:7)
• New creatures (2 Cor. 5:17)
• Heirs (Rom. 8:17)
• Citizens of Heaven (Phil. 3:20)
• Children of Light (Eph. 5:8)
• Kings (Rev. 5:10)
• a Royal Priesthood (1 Pet. 2:9)
• and my personal favorites, the aroma of Christ (2 Cor. 2:15), and Free (John 8:36)
Do I sound crazy? Maybe.
Do I care? No.
We are who Christ says we are, and we must do whatever it takes to replace lies about our identity and our reality with truth. Only when we know the truth and how it applies to every nook and cranny of our life, will it set us free. This is when we can start walking out our new nature. Bible study, time in prayer, confession and repentance are all growth and healing opportunities our loving Father has provided us through Christ. These are gifts freely given that we must make use of if we are to be effective in glorifying God through our homemaking. There is so much grace to be received – more than you and I can even comprehend.
Called to battle
Conquering and triumphing over the sin of self-pity calls for war. As mothers, what better reason to go to war than for our own soul and the souls of those under our care? We must walk worthy of our calling in Christ, using the sword of the Spirit – which is the Word of God – to cut down all sin that sprouts forth in our hearts. We are to take every thought captive to Christ and walk in humble submission. The Lord Jesus says that fullness of joy is found in obedience to His commands. If He commanded it, He will give us the grace to obey.
Our pastor, Zach Wilke, recently exhorted our congregation, “If you want a flourishing garden, pulling weeds is a necessary first step, but it will not actively produce the fruit you desire. For that, you must plant seeds, you must water them, you must prune the branches, and you must defend them against invaders.”
See things as they really are
As I like to tell my kids: “Put on your Kingdom goggles.” See things through God’s eyes, obey, and watch Christ bless you with fullness of joy as you seek to abide in Him.
Are you feeling downcast because your child just colored all over the table you just cleaned?
Are you feeling frustrated because you can’t seem to get into a regular Bible time?
Are you ticked off because your husband just put his three-day-old blueberry-crusted smoothie cup in the sink right after you started the dishwasher?
Think of these moments as opportunities to train in righteousness, practice godliness, and petition God in prayer. As I like to tell my kids: “Put on your Kingdom goggles.” See things through God’s eyes, obey, and watch Christ bless you with fullness of joy as you seek to abide in Him. These are good works, faith-strengthening tests, and obstacles prepared for you directly by the hand of God – all of it to mold you more into the likeness of our Savior.
Remember, this is the entire point. As the Westminster Shorter Catechism teaches us, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” You and I were created to be living sacrifices unto God and to find fullness of joy while doing it.
So instead of grumbling – out loud or quietly in our hearts – speak life, speak truth.
“Lord, thank You so much for washable markers and an opportunity to disciple my child.”
“Lord, forgive me for not being in Your Word regularly in this season. I am without excuse, but I also thank You for giving me an abundance of good work and teaching me to live out my faith.”
“Lord, thank You for my husband’s blueberry-crusted, three-day-old smoothie cup. I’m so grateful for him working hard to provide food for our family. One day I will miss this.”
Okay, maybe we won’t miss the blueberry-crusted smoothie cup – but you get the picture.
Replace grumbles with gratitude
Cultivating a heart of thankfulness pushes out a heart filled with grumbles and self-pity. Thanksgiving toward God for all of our blessings – starting with the fact that we are alive and breathing, all the way up to our salvation – should be meditated upon each morning. When we create a habit of thinking upon all we are grateful for, it’s amazing how the devil’s flaming darts are extinguished. It’s amazing how quickly our Lord can pull us out of the muck and mire and reorient our eyes toward Him.
“Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things.” (Phil. 4:8, NKJV)
We’re in this race together. Eyes up.
Brianna Stevens is a mother to four, wife to one, and a recovering pity-party thrower. Her passion is to encourage women to run the race well.
