Pretty Wrong

This morning my sweet daughter proudly announced, "Look, Mommy, I did a beautiful a. Aren't my letters beautiful?" I looked, and sure enough, her handwriting was excellent. Except for one problem: she was supposed to write the word branch. She wrote brach instead. Her answer was pretty, but it was wrong.

I praised her for her handwriting, then asked what she'd written. She realized her mistake and erased part of the word to correct it.

My little girl's mistake was innocent, and she readily accepted the correction. But how often do we get so caught up in the appearances of things that we miss the essential ingredients that add true value to our work? How often are we pretty wrong? And how willing are we to accept correction when we miss it completely?

We can make everything look perfect, but if it's wrong, it's still wrong. That's our life without Jesus. He's the missing letter. Are we putting Him in His proper place in each aspect of our lives? In writing and work? Parenting? Socializing? Life?

It's hard to get away from performance, but Jesus calls us to do just that, to take our eyes off our pride and seek Him for our approval, not man.