Good morning, Mrs. Cristiane!

At least I hope that’s who will also read this comment (I would like to get this off my chest).

Mrs. Cristiane, why is it that everything you do and are always seems so beautiful and correct? I scroll through your photos on the Internet and I can’t find anything that condemns you. I watch your meetings and there isn’t one word that can discredit you. Even your English is perfect! I’m not criticizing anything, absolutely nothing. On the contrary, I admire you and ask God in my prayers to be a virtuous woman. I ask God to be as pleasant to Him as you are, or like Mrs. Esther is, and how your whole family appears to be.

My biggest problem with all this is why can’t I be as perfect as you are? I must confess that you and your family are my role models. And after seeking the priority in my life, which is the Holy Spirit, I seek to be like the women in your family.

Sacrifices? I’ve done many… Tithes and offerings? I even give what I can’t. I don’t go around badmouthing other people and I don’t hold grudges. Instead, I live a simple life without much luxury or events.

I have tried so hard to be better, to be different, to be more than who I am and all I’ve seen is that nothing seems to be different. My life is way too quiet and my changes have been as slow as the pace of my routine.

Look, I’ve gotten rid of everything that condemned me (sex, drugs and rock’n’roll)! God changed my character, my behavior, my way of thinking, of acting… Okay, but so what? I want more! It seems that God did all these things very quickly in the beginning just to impress me and win me for Him, but now He has left me in standby?

What else must I do to prove to God that I love Him, so I can receive His blessings? What more does He want from me?

I don’t understand how I serve, worship and seek such a great God that has suddenly stopped appearing in my life… I honestly don’t know what else to do, say or even who else to be.

The only thing stopping me from falling into deep sorrow is that the Spirit of the Lord is in me. But I confess, I haven’t had many reasons to glorify Him lately. Is this asking for too much?

Thank you.

Luiza

That’s right Luiza, only God knows how long it took me to break out of my shell. Apparently, I already had everything. I had a happy family. I had health. I had married a man of God. I had real friends. I even had the Holy Spirit… I had everything, yet I still felt inferior to all other women. Do you know how long it took me to realize that I wasn’t just another insignificant woman? 12 years. I spent 12 years feeling the same things you described in your comment. 12 years of inferiority. 12 years of insecurities. 12 years of shyness and fear. 12 years of completely annulling the presence of the Holy Spirit in me.

Because I was already a pastor’s wife at the time, I even helped other women a little bit. I counseled women in the Church, prayed for them, worked as an assistant and did everything to please the people around me. The more I did, the more I felt inferior, and do you know why? Because I did not approve of myself, therefore I desperately needed the approval of others.

The day my father said to me: “Go and help the women in the Church,” I could have said that I was already doing that, but I didn’t. Deep down, I knew that everything I did for them was limited due to my insecurities. I didn’t think that I would be able to make a difference. At that moment, it was as if God was speaking to me through him… the scales fell from my eyes and I finally believed that God was with me – not because of what I did, but for who I was.

Luiza, I was never the same after that day. But the exterior changes did not happen at that very moment, they began happening as time passed, gradually, whenever I acted on that faith. An immediate change happened within me, in the way I began to see myself. I believed with all of my body, soul and spirit that God was with me. And this is the same change you need to accept within yourself. As long as you need to see to believe, you are not acting by faith.

I’m not perfect and I’m still growing; who isn’t, right? Make mistakes, we all make mistakes. I even share my mistakes in the books, blogs and lectures that I do, just so I can show women that, though we are not perfect, we can still make a difference in this world. Who said that God chooses perfection? On the other hand, He takes pleasure in choosing the weak things of this world, because in our weakness, He is glorified.

Maybe what’s missing is for you to give what He has given you. Those who give, receive. Those who don’t give… don’t receive. Those who wait to receive never give and, for this reason, never receive anything.

In faith,