i'M goOd

i dont really know where to start so ill just type and hopefully at some point it will all flow and make sense. and if not, i apologize in advance. i have recently found myself more and more often in this state of inadequacy. and it can be brought on by anything however it usually relates to people and how they seem to be so much more competent in this or that or for that matter this and that. im reading this book by Donald Miller, which i oh so highly recommend, and he puts this whole phenomenon in terms that make so much more sense then i could ever try to relate(not that im inadequate or anything...). he talks about that old lifeboat scenario with somebody having to be thrown out so that everyone else in the lifeboat will live. and so everybody comes up with lists and reasons as to what makes them qualifiable and good and worthy to escape being thrown out of the boat. he then relates this to life and says life is basically like a giant lifeboat in which we all walk around trying to prove ourselves to everyone else. even Christians do this, ok, maybe not all of you, but i do this (hence the reasons for my feelings of inadequacy). i am forever sizing myself up....intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, physically to whomever im around and because i tend to stray towards the "im worthless" side of the whole ego spectrum, im constantly running into this unworthiness feeling which is all-together stupid and unnecessary. ok, so all of this has been the dilemna. and the solution is obvious to the CHristian, yet takes awhile to truly incorporate it into the day to day (at least for me..) Miller seems to convey this solution better then me....

"...if it is true that our personalities are similar to the way they would be in a lifeboat, because of the fall of man, then Jesus would act and think completely different than we would. He would act and think like somebody who had their needs met by God, like somebody who had no regard for what we thought was important or not important. He would find the things humanity finds valuable and worthless absurd, and to the person in the lifeboat, Jesus would seem to see things backward." (from Searching For God Knows What)

so, Jesus has turned the way we look at everything: ourselves, others, the world, completely around and it is genious! i was reading the other day and came across Psalm 149:4. "For the LORD takes delight in His people." there are no qualifiers to that verse. thats amazing if you really think about it. God not only likes, but He takes pleasure in me just because He made me. i dont have to prove myself to Him. i dont have to talk smart or be smart or wear mascara or pray pretty prayers. nothing, i just am one of His and therefore, He delights. this has been good news. and im pretty sure that as soon as i walk into joey's preschool tomorrow my mind will start throwing inadequecy darts (that was a good one...) yet i pray that someday this Truth will cement itself into my soul...