Why I Don't Watch Extreme Home Makeover

A sport I'll never compete 

It's the right mix of emotions, sawdust, sweat plus a heart-string story that makes Extreme Home Makeover, the TV show, a success.  Not to mention that well-deserving family gets a home totally paid for with a million dollar price tag.  It really is a show of community, support and healing.  I don't have a problem with that.  


But I don't watch that show.


Extreme Home Makeover certainly has helped a lot of communities and has given many families a brighter future by making major home improvements.  They have the reputation of being honest with their intentions and doing a ton of good things.  Every week, they also highlight wonderful companies that have exhibited over-the-top generosity.


Each episode is packed with many moving moments and plenty of tears. It's not that I am against home improvements, because I am not.  I am all about making home spaces appropriate and adequate.  


But I can't watch....because...It breeds discontentment in my heart.  


When I see each episode, I forget how blessed I am.  I have the natural urge to compete, I want to line my house up next to the guy next door.   And then, in true competition (it's sad but true)....I want you to chose my house over the other guy's....from what you see from the driveway.  The discontentment fever doesn't stop at the front door, it spreads to every other area of my life.  


I soon find myself wanting to....

Run like Forest Gump. 
Be skinny like Jillian Michaels.
Be published with a book series with a sequel already written.
Placing a stick of dynamite in my blog stats and be read around the globe. 
Be better than my neighbor at anything or something. 


I have remember that God hates my comparison sheet. This competitive sport of comparison are deadly. Comparison brings disgust in His heart.   


2 Corinthians 10:12 says, "We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise." 


It's not a good practice to measure myself by the standards of man. Eventually there is always someone who is prettier, skinnier, smarter, faster, more connected, blogs faster and better plus has more readers or is just all around better than me. It makes me prideful, resentful and ungrateful.   


  "We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but not really. They are proud of being richer, or more clever, or better-looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever, or good-looking, there would be nothing to be proud about." ~ C.S. Lewis.

Knowing who are in Christ is also knowing who you don't have to be.

My danger in the sin of comparison is that I find myself looking to other people for my value and determining my value by how I compare myself with other people. It's fine for bargains, cars, and shoes… but not for people, not for things that matter, not for matters of faith. When I compare, I focus on the "i". The list lengthens of who gets what.  The best car, the higher paying job, designer trinkets, or even the most talented, the bigger blog, or even who has the latest iBook, iMac, iPhone or iPad, or anything in the land of shiny things.  

The measure of men doesn't satisfy. 

Only God's opinion matters..
and He thinks I'm pretty special just like I am..


"I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. " Philippians 4:11-12.

Do you compare yourself to others?

Paging Dr. House

Our garage is still broken from a weird random severe thunderstorm that occurred about a year ago.  You may wonder why it hasn't been fixed yet?  I honestly don't have a good answer to that question.  There have been a lot of discussions and chins rubbed regarding it.  The fix seem complicated.

When I look at the rubble in my garage I get worn out.  It doesn't motivate me to action.  I'm also amazed that my clean house disintegrates so quickly in a couple of days time.  I get so tired of fixing that. 


There are other things that remind me that I can't fix anything, like my husband who has survived cancer but still lives with chronic pain.  Those whom I love that still need Jesus in their life, or the family that has been hit with leukemia.  And then there is  a couple whose marriage was broken by an extra-marital affair.  Right now I have 3 lawn mowers at my house that need repaired.  There are some days I don't know where the fixing should start.  I think about all the unfix-able things and I get overwhelmed.  This week, one dark morning as I was leaving for work, and God encouraged me with this, "Not everything needs fixed, not everything will be fixed, and remember you are not the fixer." 


What I think needs a handyman's touch is not what really needs fixing right now.  Where I think a broom could quickly sweep away some dirt may not be my bigger need.  I will always see the obvious piles or messes and I will never enjoy being squeezed by my whatever-happens-circumstances.    


I believe God puts us in the middle of the life's rubble so that He can show us that He is our only Fix.  He purposely plunks us in the middle these-finely organized-messes, so that His glory can be revealed in the rescue.  A friend was sharing part of his recent trip to Uganda.  He told me a story that had me in tears as it melted my heart.  A baby had been left for dead.  The situation was grim, but in the dark of night the baby was found barely alive and God saved the little life with the a simple bark of a dog.  Only He could have provided a way out of the dire situation.  


I have a missionary friend that entered the hospital with a busted appendix, and has run the gambit of medical issues, so many, that he could have been on lasts week's episode of House.  And as we are still begging God for healing, I see this too as an opportunity for God's glory to be revealed.  God likes to work when nothing else will and most times we have to get to the end of ourselves before He swoops in to fix.  Sometimes, though, things are beyond repair before He provides His remedy.


The bottom line for me is this...in my messes....He is teaching me to live above my circumstances.  This is a lesson that Paul seemed to have down quite nicely.  Philippians records over and over that our response to "whatever happens" is that we must rejoice.  Humanly that's hard to do when your family has been slapped with crisis.  


God has a remedy for you, for your messes, for your piles of dirt you want to sweep under the rug, for your brokenness, for your spiritual chaos that rages within.  God can still fix your problems...God can.  He is the Master who deals with disasters that hit us in our houses, in hospitals and in those hostile marital situations.  He wants to teach us more than the truth that He can fix.  He wants us to fix our eyes on Him....trust....and let Him be God in the fixing.  

Whatever happens....please fix us God.
Whatever happens...God teach us to rejoice!