Change your perspective

Confidence doesn’t always arrive wrapped in a turquoise tuxedo with wingtips . Sometimes it shows up not knowing what to look like. You get a glimpse here and there. Over time you gain focus as you get comfortable with who God made you to be. That takes a lot of self reflection and honesty.

We have to begin to realize who we truly are. That gets ugly. It’s not wrapped in a neat bow and presented to us without struggle. It is a fight and the enemy doesn’t want us to change our perspectives on who we see ourselves as. The world has packages it sells us. A package that is rich and well off, a package that has no trouble on social media and everything is perfect, and packages that show us in our best health and happy with every thing going perfect. Very few of us if honest hit the doors at work each day with those packages. We find ourselves in the heat of the battle trying to get through the day so we can go home and deal with the stressors of life outside of work.

Perspective was one way the good Lord worked in my life. I began to listen to sermons with the faith of a child and prayed with a child like faith. Warts and all in front of God leaning into areas of my life that I had closed off. It hurt at times, but I was trying to be honest with God. His word met me everyday and guided me into understanding who I am in Christ. Once I learned and believed how loved I was from Jesus and the cost it took to give me my salvation, I gained traction in loving myself. It took decades to get past things. That was time well spent with Jesus.

There are several things you can consider on this journey. Spiritual gifts inventories help you understand your giftings. Personality tests that are often free and will be listed in our resources center, help you understand how you are wired and relate to others. Deep topical bible study helps you understand truths of scripture . God will use those studies to step you along the way in discovering who he made you to be. Worship music is very important to get the focus of yourself and onto our savior. In reality part of the discovery process was that I did not have the correct Holy View of Jesus. I was full of self and only marginally full of Christ. Once that relationship began to change, Jesus had room to work because I was getting out of His way. Again, perspective is the key. When you allow yourself to be more childlike in believing who Christ is, there is room for Him to work but He will not force himself into a relationship with you.

Jesus can show up large and in charge but I believe he wants to be invited into your everyday life and not only once a day but throughout the day with decisions and tough moments. You have to choose to get out of the way and that takes confidence to realize we are our own worst enemies and we need healing. Jesus offers that in spades but you have to lay down you hand and show him the cards He already knows your holding.