Our generation is trapped in the prison of comparison.
In everything we do, we look around to see if we measure up. Am I good enough? Pretty enough? Smart enough? Funny enough? We put ourselves on display like jesters hoping to measure up to the rest of the crowd, not wanting to be forgotten about and left alone. We look for validation in all the wrong places. It even spills over in to our relationship with God. In the church I find that most people feel inadequate. They sit back in the pew and wish they could be as good of a speaker as the preacher, or they wish they could sing like the worship leader, or they desire to have an amazing testimony like their friend. As we sit back and ponder these things, we come to the conclusion that God must just love that person more, or maybe they served Him better. Then we think to ourselves, now I'll just go try harder and serve him and sacrifice all that I can and read the Bible 5 times over, then God will have to love me as much as that person!These thoughts are all too familiar to me, because I too was stuck in the prison of comparing and validating my faith by looking at other people who were deemed "great spiritual leaders". But I broke free, and you can too. Jesus love you 100 percent, 100 percent of the time. No matter what you did in the past or what you do in the future, His love for you is exactly the same. You can neither earn it, nor can it be taken away from you. He loves you the same amount as the person you deem as the worst "sinner" in the world, and as much as the person you deem as the "holiest" in the world.
What we need to realize though is the way He loves each of is unique, because we are all unique in our thoughts, feelings, and attitudes. Instead of looking to someone else's relationship with Him, wishing yours was that, meet Him where you are in yours. Love Him where you are. Your relationship with Him doesn't have to look like anyone elses, and that's the freedom in Christ. You may feel like God wants you to dance like a crazy animal in worship, then do it! Or you might be the person who God is telling to sit and be silent in prayer, then do it! You don't have to be dancing like a crazy animal for God to love you as much as that person. He tells us each different things! You can't make your relationship with Him look like other people's or you lose the unique value of it that God values so tenderly.
Only when we cling to the relationship God is calling us too do we fulfill our God given destinies. Looking to others for direction in what God is calling us to will only leave us on the back pew, feeling lonely and insignificant.
For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago. Ephesians 2:10
Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous--how well I know it.- Psalm 139:14
Love you all,
Brittany
