Daily Living - Managing Money
Resisting the Comparison Trap
by Lynda D. Elliott, Life Coach
Q: My husband and I minister in a large church in an upscale neighborhood. Sometimes I find myself comparing houses, furnishings, cars, and clothes. This leads to intimidation and envy, and I know it is wrong, but I can’t seem to stop. Help!
A: I think most women have had similar thoughts. A friend recently told me, “When we drove up to our leader’s house, I couldn’t believe my eyes! I’ve seen hotels that were smaller than that house! The yard looked like a manicured garden, and the furniture…well, you just can’t imagine. My mind flashed to our small house. I thought, ‘We’re going to have to have these people to our house.’ Dread just poured over me.”
Sometimes we fear that we may find ourselves in the position of the poor man James refers to in Jas. 2:2-4: “Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, ‘Here’s a good seat for you,’ but say to the poor man, ‘You stand there’ or ‘Sit on the floor by my feet,’ have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?”
We must decide that who we are is more valuable than what we have, and that other people are worth more than anything that they own.
At the national prayer breakfast last year, I heard Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the Genome Project, say that if you compared the DNA on one person to another, 99.9 percent would be the same. That leaves less than one percent that is totally unique and precious. Dr. Collins reaffirmed that we are indeed vastly alike as well as uniquely different.
Most people don’t care what you have, but they do care about what makes you unique. If you are caught up in intimidation or envy, you may fail to see the need that is right before you, a need that only you can meet.
Years ago, God used me mostly with poor people. I loved working with them because they didn’t feel the need to mask their true selves, nor did they have the means to do it. However, years later, God began to use me among wealthly people. At first, I felt intimidated. “What could I offer that they don’t already have?” Like you, I was comparing myself to their accomplishments and possessions, and I was coming up short.
I think we are most comfortable and usable when we are able to forget ourselves and focus on others. Once I worked with a woman who was so intent on her day’s mission that she came to work dressed in a wrap-around skirt that simply didn’t wrap around. There was about a six-inch gap of exposed underwear! When we told her that she needed to make some adjustments, she wasn’t even embarrassed. She only became disturbed by the fact that she had to run home and change skirts. What freedom! She just laughed, wrapped herself in a big towel, made a fast trip home and back. Her focus on her mission, as well as her lack of self-consciousness, was truly admirable.
Psalm 139:15-16 is a good reminder that God created us individually and according to His purposes, “My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”
Remember that we are all more important than anything we could ever own. There is a plan and we will be given all that we need to fulfill it.
