Have you
ever noticed how perfect God’s timing is?
On Friday, we looked at James 1:9-12; and He spoke to me what seemed to
be an unusual lesson to come from these verses: recognizing and accepting who I am in
Christ. Friday night and yesterday, my
granddaughter stayed with me (big smile!) so I didn’t write a blog post. No need to feel guilty—God wanted me to see
something today that would expand on what He said Friday.
NOTES
I don’t feel
well today, so I stayed home from church.
Not wanting to miss hearing a pastor’s message, I turned on the TV. First, I watched Dr. Charles Stanley on InTouch (love that guy!). Immediately following that broadcast, Andy Stanley came on. (Being curious, I looked it up; and he’s
Charles Stanley’s son.) By the time, his
message was over, I knew that it needed to be the subject of today’s blog.
Andy was
speaking to a large group of junior high students. The subject was labels. Now, having been a victim of labels for at
least half my life, this caught my attention.
As I listened, I realized that what he was saying fit perfectly with
what our Lord had spoken to me in my last posting.
I’m
extremely suspicious that there are many adults walking around out there who
are still struggling as a result of labels that were put on them in their
childhood and teenage years. Dumb. Ugly.
Uncoordinated. Unpopular. That list can go on and on. They see themselves in the wrong light and
don’t accomplish what they could/should because they believe the labels, feel
like failures, and don’t try.
But don’t
some also struggle as a result of positive labels? Smart.
Beautiful. Great athlete. Popular.
Etc., etc., etc. Isn’t it
possible that they believed that their brains, beauty, athleticism, or
popularity would open doors that stayed closed?
When we
believe those labels, we’re giving the ones who put those labels on us power
over us. We’re telling them they’re our
bosses.
The bottom
line of Andy’s message was that God, who made us, bought us, and owns us is the
only one who has the right to label us.
As we discovered in the last post, he says that we’re all equal before
Him. In Scripture, He’s also given us
many other identifiers: God’s child,
Christ’s friend, redeemed, forgiven, free from condemnation, chosen. These are just a few. If you’re interested in reading more, I’ll
attach a separate post that you can check out; but remember, no list can
possibly be complete! The most important
thing for me to remember is that GOD LOVES ME!
He loves me more than I can even begin to imagine. How can I dwell on the labels people gave me, my imperfections, or my
incompleteness (James 1:4) when I focus on that? Even as He accepts me as I am, He challenges me to be better. His love for me makes me want to change—to
mature—into a daughter who pleases Him.
Here’s a
link to that message if you’d like to watch it.
If the link
doesn’t work, go to http://yourmove.is and watch “You’ll Be Glad You Did, Pt 1: Label Maker".
There are 3 other parts, for a total of 4.
No comments:
Post a Comment