I have found myself thinking very negative thoughts lately. Negative thoughts about myself and about who I am and what I stand for. I wish I wasn't the way I am. I wish I could just be like everyone else. I wish I could fit in and feel like I belong somewhere. I wish I didn't feel so lonely. I wish I could make this place feel like home. I wish I didn't look the way I did. I don't like being different. I don't like being weird. It hurts sometimes. Eventually these thoughts become consuming. They become normal. They begin to disguise themselves as truth. I believe them.
Then, lessons from 1 Peter. Chapter 1, Verse 1. Peter addresses the believers as "Elect strangers in the world", in another version, "Elect exiles". What does this mean?
Exiles: This world is not our home. It shouldn't be our home. It can't be our home. The moment we decide to live and die for Christ, we no longer play for the side of the world, but wage war against the world and all it stands for. Our home is with Jesus. This is temporary.
Elect: I was chosen by God before time. He knew I would sin, He knew He would send His Son to die because of MY sin. He knew all this, and He created me anyways. He loves me. You were loved before time began. He loved you first. He pursued you first. He chose you first. Why would he want to chose me? I am nothing. I am sinful and undesirable. Yet, because He alone is good, He did. Not because of who I am, but because of who He is. If he loved me before time began, there is nothing I can do to surprise him, and there is nothing He will do to fail me. And He's not finished with me. He's not finished with you.
When you live as an exile, you are a missionary not of this world. You will do love differently. You will do community differently. You understand sex, marriage, friendship differently. You do work and school differently. It means we are different. Not a curse, but a blessing - a privilege. Thank you Jesus for choosing us. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for calling me to be different... and weird. Help me to understand and live finding my value in You.
Yes, I am different. The world may say I am a freak, weird, strange. God says I am chosen. Same person, different perspectives. From what perspective will I find my value? So often I find it in fear of man, people pleasing.
"If your gaze is only to how the world responds to you, you will not live with any joy or you will sin and compromise in an effort to pursue joy where there is none to be had in the approval of those who do not love God. If you keep your eyes fixed on Jesus, if you understand His great love for you, the fact that He has chosen you, that He will never leave you, that He will never forsake you, that He loved you before time began, that He loved you before he made the earth for you to walk on, that He loved you knowing you were a sinner, that He loved you before you loved Him, that He pursued you before you pursued Him, that He chose you before He chose you... you will have joy, and you will be able to live a life on earth patterned after the life of Jesus with the help of the Holy Spirit." -Pastor Mark Driscoll, Trial and Sin
If I fear man, finding my value in the thoughts of the world, I functionally serve the world as lord. Jesus, I repent as I have done this. Please God, help me to take down all idols in my life, and return everyday fresh to the foot of the cross where it's all about Jesus.
Love Emilie.
