Impostor Phenomenon

They warned us about it my first week of graduate school.  Young, with full scholarship rides and recognized as potentially strong writers, we could easily assume the university had made a mistake.  The professor called it the “impostor phenomenon” and said it was particularly common in young top flight surgeons.  It’s this deep conviction that you haven’t arrived yet.  That somehow you are not qualified to have the position you are given.  They’ve made a mistake.  You’re not ready to be this successful, and you will be found out.
 

Nearly fifteen years later, I find myself wrestling with this again.  On the cusp of some wonderful spiritual and material blessings, I once again feel there’s been a mistake.  This loving family was supposed to go to someone else, someone who came from a loving, stable home.  And bible teachers, at least the best ones, are supposed to have studied the Bible since they could read.  Pastor’s wives are supposed to be the daughters of pastors and the very epitome of serene grace.  My life should belong to someone more qualified, someone who could take these blessings and change the world with them, someone who could make an everlasting, huge impact for Christ. 

King David must have had the same problem.  When God promised to build an everlasting house and lineage for him, David responds, “Who am I and what is my household, that You would bring us thus far?”  (2 Samuel 7:8) In his mind, he was still a shepherd boy, the littlest of his family, and some part of his brain still thought of himself that way.  Yet God called him to be king of a great nation, and in the end he had to accept God’s identity for himself above his own, no matter how strange this new identity felt.  He was a ruler, and whether he felt qualified or not, God had chosen him for the task. 

God has called me to be a wife and mother, and (so far as I can tell) a teacher.  Some days I feel like I’m playing dress up, like I’m pretending to be someone who has a loving husband and sons growing by leaps and bounds in the faith and a talent for leading other women closer in study to God.  Yet this is where I find myself in life.  It’s intimidating and there’s nothing in my background to suggest I’m up for the jobs, or even deserve a chance to work my way up into these blessings.  But God has given me some wonderful things in life and I have to choose this new identity and lead a life full of gratitude in reply.  I won’t let the fear drown out any good I can offer.  After all, if God has choose me to be this leader, who am I to say I’m not?

What part of your life do you know you don’t deserve?  A great family, financial stability, wonderful job, an extreme talent or ability?  How do you keep the fear of not being worthy of this blessing in check so that you can honor God with this blessing?

--Denyse Blasdel