God made you and
loves you. God didn’t make you and will
love you if you would just… He already
loves you right now in all your messiness and brokenness. He doesn’t wish you were more like someone
else. He wants more than anything for
you to become all that He knows you can be, because He made you and loves
you.
Do you compare
yourself to other people? I have to
remind myself all the time not to do this, because it’s so easy to fall into
thinking about my worth in terms of how I measure up to others. That’s not what God does. He doesn’t look at us and say: “I’d love her
a lot more if she was more like Blessed Mother Teresa, Ghandi, (or insert
another selfless champion of the poor or admired person here).” No, He sees us through eyes of complete and
total love. In His gaze is all of the
potential we could reach in time and eternity if we embrace who He’s made us to
be and the grace that we have in abundance from Him.I hope at some point to reach (but haven’t yet gotten to) an extended period in my life when it’s really easy to see myself through God’s eyes. Much more often I get a glimpse of the love and compassion God has for another person.
There’s only one time when comparing myself to someone else has given me hope: when I see a bit of how God looks at someone and loves him/her and it leads me to believe it’s possible He can love me that much, overlooking my numerous faults and flaws, forgiving all of my sins, and truly wanting what’s best for me.
Matthew Kelly says it well when he states that God wants us to become the best version of ourselves. That’s what will bring Him the most glory possible from our lives. Imitating others or comparing myself to others can often just bring me down or get me frustrated. I don’t fit into someone else’s mold for me. I don’t even fill my own ideal, but thank goodness I am and continue becoming all God knows I can be.
This makes me think of a beautiful song by Danielle Rose that’s certainly worth a lesson called “The Saint that is Just Me.”
Lord, open our hearts to Your love and help us to focus on You, Your will for our lives, Your vision for our future. Lead us to stop thinking or wishing we were somebody else and instead accept that we are Your beloved children and will glorify You most by becoming the saints You want us to be and are already helping us become. Amen.
