I spent a lot of my time trying to make the flowers bloom out of sheer will. I wanted the beauty that came from a healthy, beautiful, blooming plant, but the only fruit I seemed to produce on my own was either dried out, too ripe, or simply not enough. Growing up in the church, I got the message that salvation is by faith alone, but life after that is faith plus my hard work and good disposition. I stayed strong when I felt weak and I faked happy when I wanted to cry because my ideal image had everything to do with put together and nothing to do with falling apart. I didn’t understand the mystery of Christ in you, the hope of glory.

I thought he wanted me to serve for him, to witness for him, to live for him. But that isn’t what he wanted.

I have become aware of the futility of my own efforts to please the God I thought was distant, passive, and expectantly waiting for me to get it right. I worked hard, I did the right things, I never got drunk, I sang in the youth choir, I went to Bible College, I married a youth pastor.

But it’s hard to bloom when you’re either doing so much for God and you don’t know why, or you can’t find the energy to do anything for him because it never seems like enough.

I was determined to get life right while also painfully aware of all the ways I was wrong. And so to cover for myself, I hid. I stayed hidden behind my sweet personality, my strength and responsibility, my fine-how-are-you’s and my servant heart, hoping that my paper face would cover for my inadequacies.

I was trying so hard to live for God that I missed the point. He never asked me to live for him. Through his Son Jesus Christ, he lovingly invites me to live from him. One letter makes all the difference.

Before we can be the hands and feet of Jesus in the world, before we can go out and love without condition, we have to first understand who Jesus is in us. Otherwise, we are living out a self-made gospel, a gospel that boasts all flowers and leaves but no roots, which is really no gospel at all.

The life of Christ in us makes the difference between the church and Hollywood or The Red Cross. And not just historical Jesus or on-the-cross Jesus or when-I-get-to-Heaven Jesus, but Jesus in me. Jesus living his real Jesus life through believers who trust that he died a real death and rose up to real life to make a true difference.

And so I’ve written a book about the roots, about kind of hiding we do when we fear we aren’t good enough, and the kind of finding God does because he knows he is. It’s a book about the hidden inside parts, about the invisible roots, about the impossible expectations I put on myself and about the God who lifts me up.

And this book has no title.

I am so nervous asking for your help. But help? Because I know you can. You are writers and creative thinkers. No idea is a bad idea at this point. I am stuck in my own head and I want to have some good ideas to offer to the marketing team. So if you have any good ideas, or even bad ideas, or medium ideas, this would be the time to put them in the comments. Or even if you just have a word or two words or an image or a fraction of an idea that you think could communicate the message of this book, that would be helpful too. Thank you and thank you. And thank you.

The second Good Girl Project is officially complete. We talked about the masks we wear and the lies that hide behind them. Their honesty was beautiful and refreshing. I loved reading your comments last week about what you would tell your high school self. I realized two things as I read through them. One, all those things we would tell ourselves then we should probably tell ourselves now. And two, even if we could have told ourselves stuff, it wouldn’t have made any difference. Because the truth is, you can’t escape being seventeen. There has to be room to grow and mess up and learn all by ourselves. When it comes to these girls, I’m so thankful I get to have a front row seat.

There will be thirty of them. Many of them don’t know each other. Some are best friends. A couple might not really even like each other all that much. I get it. I was in high school once, too. Girls are funny when we get together. Put a bunch of high school girls in one house over night and out spills the best and the worst of them all. At least, that’s what we hope for.

I’m looking forward to hosting the 2nd annual Good Girl Project (along with my best girl Kendra) this weekend at my house. It’s for the girls in our youth group who are stuck in a private battle with that perfect, invisible good girl. A place for those of us who are caught in the cycle of trying hard to measure up with varying shades of success. A place for those of us who need to be reminded to simply be and receive in the midst of a world telling us to do and achieve. We’re gonna call that good girl out for what she is: a liar and a very bad friend.

And we’re gonna laugh a lot and share our Jesus stories and eat some chocolate because that’s what girls do. I wish I could have come to a weekend like this when I was sixteen. I’d tell myself to trust more, worry less and enjoy that stretch mark free tummy. Is there anything you wish you could tell your high school self?

If you are a good girl like me, chances are that moving toward others is easy. We will help others, serve others and pray for them, too. But there is a distinct possibility that if they turn it on us, we will move quickly on and deeply inward. We retreat to our comfortable living room behind the wreath-wearing front door of a well-built house with its white picket fence.

I will smile and wave at you from a distance, because who you think I am is infinitely more important than who I really am. Especially when I’m in a funk.

The Bible is filled up and overflowing with people who had to get close in order to be healed: The woman in the crowd. The leper. The blind man.  To be healed, they had to be touched. To be touched, they had to be close.

Good girls tend to think we are the exception.

Since The Man is a youth pastor, I spend a lot of time around teenagers. Good girl teenagers. Just like me when I was their age. And kind of just like me now. So this isn’t just my story. It is the story of so many good girls living, working and hiding while longing for authenticity and rest. For the tired teenage good girl, living like Jesus is real is not so easy. First she has to recognize those do-good masks she wears. Then she has to be convinced that it’s safe to take them off.

Secretly? I think everyone is a good girl in hiding. For the girls who have it all together and the girls who are falling apart, there is a perfect, invisible good girl living in our head, standing in the corner with her perfect self, either shaming or congratulating performance. She watches our every move, recording, judging, and manipulating. She can never be pleased. She always requires more from us.

And it’s time to shut her up. There is a new way to live.

What about you? I know I’m not the only one who has tried to be a good girl with varying degrees of success. I know I’m not the only crazy person with a good girl judge in my head, hiding behind masks of performance and self-dependence. Do you have a good girl story?