Ask God to forgive you for all the times you have said negative things about yourself, your life, and your future. Make a decision to start speaking in positive terms to everything in your life, including yourself.
Say out loud several times a day, “I accept myself. God has created me with His very own hand, and I am not a mistake. I have a glorious future, and I intend to go forward and greet each day with peace and joy.”
For years, I wished I were just a little thinner, that my voice were not so deep, that I didn’t talk so much, that I were not so straightforward in my approach to people, and so on. I have since discovered that many of the things I didn’t want were the very qualities I needed in order to do what God has called me to do.
How can we ever have peace within ourselves if we always want to be something we’re not? How can we have peace if we are mad at ourselves because we are what we are, or under condemnation because we are not perfected in behavior?
I recently read a statement by Watchman Nee that blessed me; he said that “we shall forever be what we are.” He did not mean that God isn’t changing us in behavior as we grow in Him, but he did mean that God has given each of us a specific temperament, and we shall always be, at the root, those persons God made us to be.
God gave me my bold voice and personality. I can learn not to be harsh and rude, but I will always be bold and aggressive. I am a preacher and teacher of God’s Word. I am a mouth in the body of Christ, so to speak. God uses my mouth. I will always talk a lot. I can learn not to enter into idle talk, which we will discuss later, or say things that hurt people; but I will never be a quiet, soft-spoken person.
You will always be you, so accept the basic you and let God be God in your life. Stop wrestling with yourself, focus on your strengths, and enter into peace.
Peacekeeper #10
FOCUS ON YOUR UNIQUE STRENGTHS
P
art of self-acceptance is realizing that you are unique in yourself and will never be exactly like someone else. God wants variation, not boring sameness. Actually, if we look around, we see that God is extremely creative. We enjoy different flowers, trees, birds, weather. It seems that a lot of what God has created has many varieties, even people.
Don’t struggle to be a carbon copy of someone you admire. You are unique, and there is something you can do that nobody else in the entire world can do exactly the way you can. God had to teach me the all-important lesson of not comparing myself with others and competing with them or their abilities. He had to teach me to “be free to be me” before He could use me the way He had planned.
I taught home Bible studies for five years, and then for one year, God sort of sat me on a shelf and I did nothing. During that year I decided I needed to settle down and live a “normal” life. I decided I needed to be a “normal woman.” I had always thought my hopes and ambitions were out of the ordinary, but Satan was tormenting me with thoughts that I was really weird and something was wrong with me.
I kept my house clean and neat but had no real interest in decorating to the degree that many of my friends did. They went to craft classes and had home-decorating parties on a regular basis. I could hardly sew a button on my husband’s shirt, while one of my friends made clothes for her entire family. I felt destiny calling me while they were totally content doing things that really bored me. What they were doing was important also, it just was not what I was called to do.
I began to think that I just needed to straighten up and be what a woman “ought to be.” I wasn’t sure exactly what that was, so I tried to pattern myself after other women I knew. One friend was really sweet in nature, so I tried to speak softly and be sweet like her. Another had a garden and canned vegetables, so I tried that. I also took sewing lessons and attempted to make some clothes for my family. I was miserable, to say the least. I had forced myself into a mold that God had never designed for me.
All of these carnal ideas were birthed out of deep-rooted insecurities left over from my abusive past. I was insecure in who I was, I felt deeply flawed, and I had a shame-based nature, so I kept trying to reshape myself into what seemed acceptable to the world.
Woman preachers were not exactly at the top of the list of what the world applauded, especially in 1976 when I began, and even more so in the denomination we were part of. I am sure these fleshly efforts of mine grieved the Lord, yet He allowed me to go through the process of comparing, competing, and being miserable until I finally realized I was not
weird,
I was
unique.
Something unique has value because it is one of a kind, whereas something just like many others is not as valuable.
I was comparing myself to wonderful women who were operating in their natural, God-given abilities. They were happy because they were doing exactly what God had assigned to them. I was unhappy because I also was trying to do what God had assigned to them to do. God patiently forms each of us in our mother’s wombs with His very own hand. When you consider your strengths, remember this verse:
For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be. (Psalm 139:13–16
NIV
)
We are not accidents, not something that just got thrown together with no forethought. Each of us is here on purpose, chosen to live in this particular time period on purpose. Fighting yourself is like fighting God, because you are His handiwork, predestined to good works (see Ephesians 2:10).
When Paul was converted, he certainly had heard about the great apostle Peter. I am sure Peter was someone everyone looked up to because of the great way in which God used him and the strong gifts he expressed. Peter was a leader among leaders. One would think that Paul would have sought out Peter for approval and friendship, yet we see just the opposite. Paul went away into Arabia and remained there for three years first, then he finally went to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Peter. Then, after a period of fourteen more years, during which he ministered where God led him, he went to Jerusalem again to meet with Peter and some of the other apostles (see Galatians 1:17–2:12).
Paul had confidence in his call and did not feel the need to compare himself with Peter or anyone else. We see evidence of this fact in other Scriptures: In Galatians 1:10, Paul stated that if he had been trying to be popular with people, he would not have become an apostle of the Lord. Why? Because following people rather than God can get us on the wrong paths for our lives. God does not want copies—He wants originals. Paul was an original, not a copy of Peter or the others, and that is how God wants it.
In the beginning of my ministry, I tried to get into several different groups of well-known preachers. I wanted their approval, and I wanted to compare what I was doing with what they were doing to see if I needed to change anything. Although I made improvement the year I spent “doing nothing” (except struggling to be what I thought was a regular woman), I still had insecurities and would have become a carbon copy of someone else if I had had the opportunity to do so.
I was quite frustrated when God would not allow me to have friends in ministry at that time, but I didn’t understand that He was training me personally and did not want any interference in those early days of preparation for my calling.
Insecure people are not good at saying no! They are not good at being different; they usually bend in the direction everyone is going, rather than following their hearts wholly. When God was ready to promote our ministry to a more visible platform, one of the things I often heard was, “You are a breath of fresh air! You’re unique, not like everyone else out there.” That does not mean all the others were not wonderful and needed, it simply means we need variety.
Paul’s message was the same as Peter’s, yet with a different emphasis, and that is the way it should be in order for people to mature spiritually. We often fear being different; we are bored with sameness, yet somehow we feel safe with it.
Comparing ourselves with others and trying to be like them will definitely steal our peace; it is one of the most frustrating things we can go through. Beware of comparing any aspect of your natural or spiritual life with anyone else’s—it will produce only turmoil.
S
PIRITUAL
C
OMPARISONS
I remember hearing one preacher talk of how often he saw Jesus. I had never seen Jesus, so I wondered what was wrong with me. Another person I knew prayed four hours every morning. I could not find enough to pray about to keep praying for four hours and always ended up bored and sleepy, so I wondered what was wrong with me. I had no gift to remember large portions of Scripture like someone I knew, who memorized all the Psalms and Proverbs as well as other entire books of the Bible, so I wondered what was wrong with me. I finally realized that nothing was necessarily wrong with me because I could not do what they could. The fact was, I was preaching all over the world, and none of them were doing that.
Whatever we cannot do, there are many other things we can. Whatever someone else can do, there are also things they cannot. Don’t play the devil’s game any longer. Don’t compare yourself with anyone in any way, especially not spiritually. We can see other people’s good examples, but they must never become our standard. Even if we learn from them how to do something, we still will not do it exactly the same way.
Dave taught me how to play golf, and he taught me according to how he swung the golf club, but I don’t swing mine the way he does and never will. We see this same example over and over. I hold the steering wheel of the car differently from the way he does, we apply the brakes differently, when I iron a shirt I start with the collar, my friend starts with the sleeve. What is the difference how we iron the shirt as long as it gets ironed properly?
I know people who say they have never felt the presence of God, and it really frustrated them when they heard others say things like “Did you feel God in this place tonight?” Some have great emotional experiences when they are born again or receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, while others take it completely by faith and feel absolutely nothing, although they do see the fruit in their lives later.
At some time or another, I think we all fall into the trap of wondering why we are not like others we know or why we don’t have the same experiences they do, but it
is a trap
—and a dangerous one. We are caught in a snare set by Satan when we enter into spiritual competition and comparison and become dissatisfied with what God is giving to us.
We should trust that God will do the best thing for each of us and let Him choose what that is. If we trust God in this way, we can lay aside our fears and insecurities about ourselves. How we respond to God in different areas can be the result of many different things, such as our natural temperaments, past teachings, and levels of natural boldness. For example, Thomas was a doubter and God loved Him, but He also corrected him for having little faith. Seeing and feeling are great, but Jesus said, “Blessed are those who believe and have not seen” (see John 20:29).
I am sure we would all like to see into the spiritual realm and have an abundance of supernatural experiences, but being frustrated if we don’t only steals our peace and certainly does not produce visions of Jesus. I have had some “experiences” with the Lord, but I have also gone for many years without anything but faith.
I went through all the frustration, all the wondering what was wrong with me, wondering if I had committed some sin and God could not get through to me, wondering, reasoning, anxiety, unrest, no peace. . . . Then I found the answer:
Don’t compare your spiritual life with that of anyone you know or anyone you read about.
Be yourself. You are unique, and God has a plan just for you.
C
OMPARING
C
IRCUMSTANCES
Comparing your circumstances with those of other people will steal your peace and cause confusion about God’s unique plan for you. Remember, the devil wants to devour the blessings that God has set for you. The Word says to “withstand him; be firm in faith [against his onset—rooted, established, strong, immovable, and determined], knowing that the same (identical) sufferings are appointed to your brotherhood (the whole body of Christians) throughout the world” (1 Peter 5:9).
This Scripture shows us that we are to resist the devil quickly, stand firm against him at the onset of his attack, and know that everyone is going through difficulties in life. When we are in tough times, it seems Satan taunts us with thoughts that no one has it as bad as we do, but that is not true. There is someone in much worse circumstances than ours, no matter how difficult your or my situation may seem.
Realizing this builds gratitude and thankfulness, rather than self-pity, in our hearts. We should not be glad that others are suffering, but it does help us not to think we are the only ones waiting for a breakthrough from God. No matter how long we may have been waiting for God to do something we have prayed about, someone else has waited longer. No matter how sick, or poor, or lonely, or frightened any one of us may be, someone, somewhere is in worse condition.
God never promised us a life without trials; in fact, He promised us the opposite. He said there would be trials but that we should not fear them. “For He [God] Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down (relax My hold on you)! [Assuredly not!]” (Hebrews 13:5).