Do you like yourself? Do you believe in yourself and in what you can do? Jesus did!
When He was 12 He knew that He had to be about His Father’s business.
When He was 30 He knew that He had to go into the wilderness to be tempted; AND PASS!
When He was 30+ He knew that He had to start preaching the truth; and not care who got upset!
When He was 30++ He knew that He had to have help and had to pick trumpets; and not care if they made mistakes.
When He was 33 1/2 He knew that He had to go to Golgotha and be tortured; AND NOT GET MAD!
How do you start from nothing, come out of nowhere, being a nobody in the eyes of the civil and religious leaders, and knowing that you will be misunderstood for your entire ministry UNLESS you have total confidence in who you are? And if not that, then He was left with only one other option. He had to be 100% confident in God! You see, you either believe in the Call, or the Person who gave you the call; if you are to make it in this world.
To be a Daniel, you must be willing to PRAY when told not to, and even PRAY when the lions are staring at you. You have to BELIEVE or you will fall asleep in death.
To be a David, you must be willing to PRAISE when you are all alone on the side of a hill with a bunch of stinky sheep; if you are to become a King in God’s kingdom. You have to believe or you will fail in misery.
To be a Deborah, you must be willing to PROPHECY when you are faced with the needy warriors of God who seem to be defeated; if you are to be a good judge in this world. You have to believe or you will fear in terror.
The forces of Darkness are waging war against God’s forces of the Light. Either the LIGHT will dispel the darkness, or the DARKNESS will engulf the light. Either you will be able to rise up and shout ‘GREATER IS HE THAT IS IN ME’ and ‘I HAVE FOUGHT THE GOOD FIGHT’ or you will flee before your enemies seven ways.
Christ did not fail because HE CHOSE to believe. He believed what the Scriptures said about Him. He believed what if Father said about Him, and in what His Father asked Him to do. He believed what Moses and Elijah said to Him on the mount of transfiguration. And He received strength from angels in the garden of Gethsemane because He was not willing to give up believing.
Wherever you are in your personal growth before the Lord, you must believe for the next step in your life. Your ‘step’ to take may seem REALLY HIGH, but God (who is able to make people walk on water) can surely lift you up to where you belong. He can make your feet climb to high places. He can take you from feeling and thinking like you are a beggar and a spiritual pauper to becoming a WEALTHY SAINT. You without God are not much; perhaps a seed. You planted in God, with God, nourished by God, and cared for by God can become a MIGHTY TREE! It is your choice to chose confidence. All you have to do is BELIEVE IN GOD 100% and stop doubting in yourself. The opposite of PRIDE is not always humility (‘feeling humble’) but rather SURRENDER and obedience. God and Christ conquered the spiritual world. God and you and Christ will one day RULE THE EARTH! Take hope. And believe. And go do what you know is RIGHT to do. In the end, you will like yourself just a little bit better.
Original Copyright: © Anthony J. Massotti, Th.M. 5/30/1999