LOVE BETTER CAMP

by Linda Dominique Grosvenor
www.LindaDominiqueGrosvenor.com

When my non-fiction book The Plural Thing: Spiritually Preparing for Your Soul Mate was released I was beyond tears. Sure part of those tears was because I was happy that I had finally birthed the revised copy of the book that He had been trying to get out of me for years, but partly because I’m a perfectionist and after I received the entire shipment, I flipped through and realized that there were some glaring typos in it. Now of course I knew the whole story. I knew that when God told me to add four additional chapters to what already existed that I was no longer in possession of the original “proofed” manuscript. I knew the story about how I had to search online and purchase a copy of my own book and then have my husband type it over for me–page by page. After all of that, I was just happy that it was done. Elated. I went through it with a fine tooth comb, or so I thought. But I was tired, just wanted to see the book manifest and did a rush job with the proofing which gave me exactly what I should have expected–a book with some glaring typos. God however took the thing I despised the most “imperfection” to do just the opposite–perfect me.

The book arrived. People outside of my cheerleader circle declared how it had changed not only their way of life and the kinds of relationships they found themselves in, but their way of thinking. I praised God, but I was still kind of shaky about it. My husband was the book’s most staunch advocate. He was able to pique interest in the book by his own testimony alone, which included how we had come together as a couple in the first place. The excitement of the book was always on his lips. The book changed him, the book changed me, the book brought us together–knit us more tightly as a couple. Still, despite all of that, I pulled back from promoting the book because in the back of my mind I couldn’t let go of the fact that it wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t error-free, it wasn’t something that I wanted to smile and say, “that’s mine!” My uneasiness with the typos was not so much what people would say, but whether they would taint the book’s impact–and I didn’t want that or want to be the cause of that. That’s when I heard it. Meditating on the scenery right outside my window one afternoon He told me, “God is the perfecter of the imperfect.” For me it was like God saying, “Enough already!” or “You’ve moped around about it long enough!” He was letting me know that He could and would take something that is imperfect and make it, shape it, mold it into something that is perfect or as close to perfect as He was willing to allow to accomplish His purpose. That meant me. That meant the book. That meant my husband. That meant my life. That meant “our” life together–and all things striving to be perfect that could always benefit from becoming a little better.

1 Peter 2:9 says, “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who that called you out of the darkness into his marvelous light.” And thankfully with that I understand that He has called me and us into the marvelous light. He can take something out of darkness and endow it with His brilliant light. Imperfection isn’t a death sentence. We are not our mistakes. We are not our errors. We are not just comprised of the former, but we are the latter rain too. I thank God that I am letting Him move in regards to the book. I haven’t had to force-feed people to sell them on the concept and I don’t have to preface my conversation with people who have read the book with, “I know there were some typos but…” anymore. Can an imperfect book still change peoples lives and elevate them in God? Yes, I believe it. It has and continues to do so. Of course all of my subsequent editing won’t go back and make those older copies typo-free. But the new copies will be better than the old and while God has allowed me to live out my entire life in that book, so it continues in the story of how even the books themselves were imperfect, yet has changed lives. Perfecting the imperfect. It doesn’t surprise me one bit that God can do anything, but fail.