Day 2499 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.


Romans 5:8 NIV

Something a little different hit me during Christmas this year. It's something that I don't remember thinking or realizing during Christmas before. It's a message that I think gets lost or overlooked or forgotten or is just too amazing to think about. But thinking about the meaning of Christmas left me with this incredible realization that I think we all need to hear: God believes in us!

Even after typing that just now it left me sitting here for a second just taking it in. That's a message of Christmas that I don't know many have heard or considered. God sent His Son because He saw something in us worth saving. He saw something in us that was worth enduring that pain and suffering of shedding His blood to cover our sins. He saw something in us worth dying for. And that's something that maybe we haven't even been able to see in ourselves.

I'll be the first to admit that I've not always seen what He apparently sees. I think many of us can say the same thing. We've gotten used to being our worst critics. We live in a world that is all too ready to point out our flaws and make us feel ashamed of not being perfect. And that’s what we’ve learned to do as well. We've become used to thinking that way and seeing ourselves how the world sees us.

But God doesn't see what the world sees. He doesn't have the same requirements this place has. Oddly enough, He's not even as hard on us as we are on ourselves. We get stuck seeing only the mistakes we make, the flaws we have, and the shame of not being who we want to be. We get stuck looking at our sins and mistakes and the weight of the guilt they bring. And before long that becomes all we can see.

We lose the ability to see anything good in ourselves because the flaws and weaknesses just seem to stick out more than anything else. Thankfully God is different. He's so different that He can help us be different. He can help us learn to see things differently. He can help us let go of the weight we've been carrying so that we can actually experience His love and peace and freedom.

Life is often a heavy load. But I think a lot of it is stuff that we bring on ourselves. The bottom line is that we just celebrated the birth of a King who came down from Heaven to show us just how much God loves us. Even though we don't deserve it. Even though we're not perfect. Even though we still slip up and make mistakes. Even though we've not been able to see anything of value and may have never felt worthy of anything good. He still loves us!

Friends, we say that Jesus is the greatest gift that has ever been given. That's because He is the embodiment of the purest, most powerful, most real form of love there is. There is something incredible in you. There is something of value in you. There is something special in you. God made you in His image and has written this unique story that you get to experience. He has planned so many amazing things for each of us. It's time we stop missing that by focusing on all the wrong things. It’s time to start focusing on the good a little more.

Today is the day after Christmas. The gifts are opened. The parties ended. The food gone. The decorations one step closer to going back into storage. But don't pack away the meaning of Christmas. Don't throw it out with the torn up wrapping paper and last sliver of pie that sat out too long. Hold on to it. Hold it tight every single day because it's a message that came to save our lives and change the way we see everything.

It’s the promise that God believes in us and is willing to do whatever it takes to help us see what He sees so that we can experience the changes that only He can make to lead us to being the people that He made us to be, the people that He has seen all along!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 1996 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Image
Isaiah 44:22 NIV Redemption: To compensate for the faults or bad aspects of something; to gain or regain possession of something in exchange for payment; or to fulfill or carry out a pledge or promise. Our God is so big that He fits every definition of the word! We've been talking about how we don't have to be lost in doing things our own way forever and how He will welcome us back whenever we finally realize we need Him more than anything else. Redemption is why. All of our mistakes, all our weaknesses, all our excuses have been washed away. There is literally nothing left between us and God except for us. We are all that remains in the way of the healing and forgiveness that we need. Seriously, all that stands in our way of the peaceful and joyous freedom we're looking for is our choice to turn back to Him. That's it! I think that one of the biggest hurdles we face in making that choice is that it truly seems impossible. Whether we openly admit them or not, we all kno
Read more

Day 2317 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Image
Proverbs 16:18 NIV Most, if not all of us have this innate problem that we've developed. Maybe it's a result of living in a world that has nearly no concept of wrong. Maybe it's just a product of our deceitful minds wanting to do whatever we want without having to weigh the consequences. Whatever the reason, we've somehow gotten it in our minds that we're incapable of making mistakes. We've become conceited to the point that we actually believe that we never get anything wrong. And while that may make us feel good, there's no avoiding the truth that tells us otherwise! Each of us make the wrong choices. We jump to conclusions. We take things out of context. We rush through things. We assume that we know what someone else is talking about without making sure. We answer before we hear the full question. We hear things that someone else doesn't necessarily say. We let things slip out of our mouths that we may not really mean. We give in to selfishness witho
Read more

Welcome to The Forge!

Image
Welcome to The Forge! This page is all about God, our faith in Him, and finding our way back to the truths and principles found in His Word. As I'm sure many of you have noticed, the world is losing its mind. Sin is celebrated. Wrongs are viewed as right. What's right is out the window and seldom considered. Popularity is the driving force behind many actions. Being politically correct is the norm and anything else is just not acceptable.  Well, none of that nonsense flies in The Forge. We are stronger t han the pressures of the world around us. We are tougher than the pull of sin. We are called to rise above the fog of this hate-fueled judgment that the world is covered in. God didn't create us as timid little beings that need to be led around by our noses. He designed us to do better than simply go with the flow. No, He made us much different than that. He made us to be leaders, He created us to go against the grain, live outside the lines, and stand tall and hold firm to
Read more