A group of us are doing some leadership training via computer conference calls, it is extremely awesome how much technology has changed in the past 20 years. We can see each other and talk to each other around North America, it really is quite amazing.
We are carrying on a journey that began a couple years ago for some and for others it started a while ago, this journey we are on, is studying how God sees you. God does not see you as the broken person you think you are.
Oh no, God sees you as the completed and perfect person He created you to be. It is a fairly mind blowing concept. God calls us to be His image bearers because we are what the world sees and we are supposed to reflect Him in our character, we are to be God’s message.
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son…” John 3:16 God so loved. Love.
“Let’s make man in our image.” Genesis 1:26
Everything God made – He said it was good. Do you believe Him about "you"?
How do we reflect God’s image if we have a flawed image of ourselves?
For example: I had a few years of being told I was not good enough and that I was fairly unlovable. These kind of words and comments are hugely damaging to our self-esteem, we walk on in life thinking that these statements, made by another imperfect human being are truth. As a child I was called bucky beaver, or fatty, now there are some names no child wants. I have to be totally honest and admit that I sometimes have a hard time believing I am pretty even to this day. I am working on it and please understand this is not a plea for self-esteem building emails back to me, rather it is me baring my soul and what kinds of things have influenced me.
It took God to break through to me in a very direct and deliberate way to get my attention. I was challenged a long time ago to ask God how He saw me, did He have a name for me?
This was probably at my most darkest time, I was severely depressed, heartbroken and really was not sure what I was even here for. I heard that little inner impression that I have come to know as God’s voice inside of me say one word: “sunshine”. I, of course, dismissed this immediately as weird and since I was driving at the time I continued to drive on. A little while later, a song come on to the car radio “you are my sunshine.”
Right at that moment, the deep dark clouds overhead immediately parted and a ray of sunshine (no I am not lying) came beaming down onto the car. It was only momentary but it was enough. I started to laugh because the thought that God ever saw me as “sunshine” was so totally absurd.
As much as I dismissed the whole experience, God had not. Sometimes when God tells us something it is just like Him to confirm it, and for me, the slow learner He often has to do a few repeat performances. I do not remember the timeline but it was within a month after the above incident, I went to my weekly Bible study. I had never mentioned the “sunshine” thing, because hey, it was weird for me as well.
Anyways we got to prayer time and this man, with his wife sitting right there, got up and came over to me, he got down on one knee and started singing, “you are my sunshine”, right to me. I sat there stunned, and could not hold the flood of tears pouring down my cheeks. I sat there like a deer caught in headlights and when he was done, he simply said, “God told me to sing you that song, I guess it means something to you.”
Now that has to be 13 or 14 years ago, did I start believing it? Not right away. I had to work at believing it. It took saying it, thinking it, and believing it, actually letting the persona soak into my spirit. It is not hard for me now. I find that it is human nature to believe the labels other people have put on us, rather than listen to the truths of the one who created us.
I started praying years ago that I would make a difference when I walked into a room, that I could change the atmosphere into which I step and you know, because God goes with me, I believe I do. (okay it is not always good, but I am a work in progress).
In our computer conference we were talking about a lady who walks with confidence into a room, she believes that God has called her to change the atmosphere into which she steps – when she enters the room, she announces her presence with “Ta Da!” “Ta Da” in the dictionary says it means: impressive entrance or dramatic announcement. I love that, it makes me smile.
Let’s make it our goal to be God’s image bearers, His messengers and a reflectors of His love so that we can change the atmospheres into which we step for the better – let’s be the ones who can confidently enter a room and say: “Ta Da!”