Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Trusting God”
Our Bible verse for today: “For it was You who created my inward parts; You knit me together in my mother’s womb, I will praise You because I have been remarkably and wonderfully made made. Your works are wonderful, and I know this very well.” Psalm 139:13-14 (HCSB)
Our thought for today: “Trust God for who you are.”
When I was a young boy I secretly wanted to be Timmy the boy on the show “Lassie”. He had a nice home, a great dog, and he was always involved in some perilous adventure that was dangerous, but always ended well. As a teenager I wanted to be Desi Arnez Jr. No, not Lucy’s husband, that was Ricky Ricardo, I’m talking about their son – “Little Ricky” on the show but “Desi Jr.” in real life. I wanted to be him. As a teenager he was rich, good looking, and he had a band with one of the sons of Dean Martin. He was also frequently on the cover of “Teen Beat” magazine. Desi was cool. And I was not.
Since then I’ve only wanted to be 6′ 3″. That’s it. Not anybody else in particular, just tall.
If you’re willing to be transparent and honest about this then I think you’ll admit to having similar thoughts about yourself. Why do we do that? Why can’t we be happy with who God created us to be? The truth is that those people we’re thinking we would like to be like they’re almost certainly wishing they were different too.
The Biblical truth is that God created us to be the person He wants us to be. He determined who our father and mother would be. He knit us together in our mother’s womb. He was the one who decided how tall we would be, the color of our eyes, the natural abilities we would be endowed with, and everything else about us. And since He is sovereign, since He is all-knowing, all-wise, and since He loves us fully and unconditionally, we can relax and just trust Him for who He created us to be.
Of course that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to improve ourselves in areas that need improvement, and it is ok to work to develop skills and talents that we weren’t born with, but we still need to learn to be happy with who we are. The blues singer and actress Ethel Waters put it well when she famously said, “Honey, God don’t create no junk!”
The fact is that I’m never going to get those extra five inches of height and so I need to be happy at 5′ 10″. And for the most part, you are going to continue to be you, just as God created you. How much better would this world be if all of us simply learned to be comfortable in our own skin?
I encourage you to simply trust God for who you are.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim
Oak Hill Baptist Church 