Monday Manna

I know I said that I wouldn’t share my comments about my Monday Manna scripture but I couldn’t resist. So here goes:
At times I struggle with trying to conform to my idea of being a “good Christian.” So much in fact that I tend to feel enormous amounts of guilt when I do, say, think or feel something that does not fit my idea of a “good Christian” [It doesn’t help that when I tell someone that my husband is a preacher and they reply, “Oh my gosh, you’re married to a preacher!” It's like they are thinking, how dare a minister marry such a heathen!]
Well, we all know that harboring guilt and feelings of inadequacy can be defeating so I turned to the Bible for a little help. What I found was that it is my job as a “good Christian” to surrender to God and allow Him to complete His work in me. I can never live holy on my own….I will surely fail. Only by grace (God’s precious gift of unmerited, unearned favor) will I come close to getting this “being a good Christian thing” right.
Ephesians 2:8
NIV: For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God
Amplified: For it is by free grace (God's unmerited favor) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ's salvation) through [your] faith. And this [salvation] is not of yourselves [of your own doing, it came not through your own striving], but it is the gift of God