Our Divine Design
JULY 13, 2024
by Kyle Winkler
Choking under pressure is common to the human experience. It is a well-documented phenomenon in the world of professional athletics. Studies reveal that professional players make free throws significantly more during training sessions than in games where the stakes are high. It is the same for tennis players, golfers, and professionals of every sport. The more an athlete perceives that something is on the line, the higher the rate of failure.1
The reason is the same as to why brilliant students bomb a test, why interviewees go blank when asked a question they had memorized, why writers experience a mental block when up against a deadline, or why people struggle to recall the name of someone familiar when they need it most. Scientists observe that high-pressure moments, whether real or perceived, send the body into “danger mode” during which the brain produces a cocktail of stress-related hormones that impair memory and abilities. In this mode, the body attempts to shut down high-energy-consuming functions so that it can focus on survival. In other words, the higher the pressure, the more you are weakened physically.
My point is that people are not designed by God to live under high-stakes pressure. That is why the body interprets it as danger. Yet, this is precisely how most Christians live—not just in moments of necessity, but their entire lives. I did. Because of my distorted perception of both God and the Gospel, I believed I was saved by His grace but maintained by my performance. The stakes could not have been higher! Imperfect behavior meant that my salvation was at risk. Insufficient effort, discipline, or change meant that God was displeased. If God was displeased, then I feared He would not bless me, accept me, or love me. That meant I had to try harder.
Please hear this with the compassion that can come only from someone who has been there: if perfection or even near perfection is what you believe God desires from you, then you are living opposite of what God really desires. In this lifestyle, you will never realize the abundant, victorious life that God promises because you will buckle constantly under the pressure of trying to earn it or prove yourself worthy of it.
The pursuit of perfection is unsustainable because it is impossible. You are not designed by God to live under the pressure of pleasing Him, changing yourself, or producing His promises. You are designed for something else.
I know that some Christians vehemently oppose the idea that we are not created to live for God but you are here to live in and from God’s pleasure. I know this not only because I receive their messages, but because I was one of them for the first decade of my faith. I would have scoffed that this was some sort of “Christianity-lite” and gone on my way to pursue something deeper, something that required more sacrifice, more grit, more crucifixion. And I did, repeatedly. Until I tried everything with little to show for it, except exhaustion, fear, and shame. That is why I begged God to know, What more do I have to do?
That may be the most natural question to ask. After all, our culture is ruled by a system of perform-to-prove, do-to-get, achieve-to-succeed. From birth, our lives are lived as slaves to this pattern. It is no wonder, then, why anything less seems unnatural or even too good to be true. It is also no wonder why we mistake the character and expectations of God for the characteristics and expectations of the world, making Him out to be more like a taskmaster than the unconditionally loving Father that He is.
It is because of what this backward kind of lifestyle produces that the apostle Paul encouraged, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world” (Romans 12:2 niv). Instead, friend, conform to the divine design. You are designed to live pressure free. You are designed to operate from a position of rest, not of earning. You are designed for Eden—the place where peace, joy, and all good things grow effortlessly.
1. Alex Krumer, “Why Do Top Athletes Choke Under Pressure?” PsychologyToday.com, February 11, 2022, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/sports-and-psychology/202202/why-do-top-athletes-choke-under-pressure.
Excerpted from Kyle Winkler’s book, Permission to Be Imperfect. Used with permission of Baker Books.