Devotion written for my church's prayer blog
Who Told You That Series
“I Can’t Help the Way I Am”
Philippians 4:9 What
you have learned and received and heard and seen in me – practice these things,
and the God of peace will be with you.
So many excuses popped into my head a few years ago when I was
presented with going on my first mission trip.
Thoughts such as: “I’m not cut out for that. I don’t have a big, booming
personality. I wouldn’t be good at that, I get nervous when I try to talk to
strangers. I can’t help the way I am, that is just the way God made me.” But I had to ask myself “Who told you that?
Who told you, you don’t have what it takes?” The truth is that I was so focused
on what I thought I couldn’t do, that I wasn’t focused on what God could
do.
We all have different personality traits. If we didn’t, it would be one big, boring
world. Each of us are better at certain
things than others, and each of us have some challenges that we have to work
through. We can choose to stay “stuck”
in those challenges, or we can choose to overcome them being obedient to God and
let Him work through us.
God calls us to learn, receive, hear and see Him, and put
our experiences into practice then He promises His peace will be with us. He also tells us in Mark 16:15 to go into the
world and proclaim the gospel to all creation. If He calls us to go on a
mission trip, minister to a neighbor, preach the gospel, or any number of other
things, He will equip us with what it takes to carry out that mission. He knows our personalities and our challenges,
but He also knows His power and that through Him, we can overcome our feelings
of “I’m not good enough and I can’t help the way I am.”
Father, Help us to not
live with the mentality that “we can’t help the way we are” because the truth
is we can observe the things you say and do and imitate you becoming more and
more like you. Please mold and transform
us into your image and help us to be obedient to all you call us to do.
Devotion written by
Ruth Wittenbrook
