I was recently challenged with this concept.Know yourself, love yourself, be yourself.
I feel like God is challenging me to be comfortable in my own skin. I constantly have that Holy spirit nudge saying, "be who I created you to be". But it doesn't change the outside influences that are nudging me in a million directions. The world nudges me to act a certain way, friends nudge me to be certain way, church nudges me to feel a certain way. Not that these "other" ways are bad ways or even wrong ways. But I have to question if they are the ways that God has for ME.
I was reading today about Mary and Joseph and began to think about this concept for their lives. For them to BE themselves, for them to BE who God had created them to be...the had to turn from everything that they knew. Everything that was religiously right, everything that was socially right, everything that was right for their immediate family. They had to turn from that and turn to the plan that God had for them. That must have been unbelievably hard. I think the reason they we able to "BE" who God created them to be is because of their closeness to God. If I had peer pressure talking in one ear and an Angel of the Lord talking in the other....well it seems like it would be easier to follow God. It wasn't like they could set back and wonder if any of what was happening was God or not. The KNEW it was God. And they knew it was God because of their closeness to Him. They were close enough to feel Him kick. Yes it may have been a proximity closeness and not as much a relationship closeness. But it was closeness nonetheless.
So I think about that in my life. If I am to be who God created me to be. To follow where God leads. Then I must be close enough to Him to never question His direction. I must be close enough to hear His voice and follow His leading. I must be close enough that when I look in the mirror, I am certain that I am being exactly who He created me to be. And when I am certain of that....then it is easy to love myself and BE who who designed me to be. When outside influences come beside be and speak into my life it will be easy to tell the difference between them and God and it will be easy to know when they line up.
God help me to know who I am in you. Help me to love your creation. And help me to be without question who you made me to be.
~LL
