Compare to Lose

I bet all of you parents have heard a question similar to this one:  "Why can't I have a piece of drawing paper? My sister has one."  I regularly refuse to answer when it is phrased this way in an attempt to discourage the comparison reasoning in my Crew.  I've tried to instruct them that comparing ourselves to anyone but Christ only feeds our sin natures.  Either there is someone who we think we are "better than", so it feeds our pride.  Or there is someone who we are "not as good as", so we throw a pity party.

This conversation leads me to think about myself & how I tend to compare myself to my friends.  I go to one sister's pristine house & leave feeling inferior.  I watch  another parenting her child & get embarrassed because my children don't responded as well to me.  I see how much fun a friend has & wish I was more like her.  Don't misunderstand me, I have LEARNED a lot from these sisters.  I keep a cleaner house than I used to, I have adopted some parenting techniques & phrases, and I even let my kids have chocolate chips on their pancakes-- sometimes! ;)  The point is, God made me for the home, husband, children, time, and place where He put me.  And my sisters are perfectly suited for the lives God has given them.  So I need to be content with the ways I'm equipped for the path He's given me, and strive to improve in the areas where I'm weak.

for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?  For when one says, "I follow Paul," and another, "I follow Apollos," are you not being merely human?  What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each.  I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.  So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.
I Corinthians 3:3-7

I realize that this is a different context, but as I was reading this recently, the principle of not comparing ourselves to each other is what struck me.  So, take it or leave it... =)