For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you.
Psalms 139:13-18 NIV
Look into the mirror, do you recognise someone?
Is it who you always hoped you would become
When you were young?
You’ve caught me. Again, I’m quoting from Glaswegian miserablists Del Amitri.
But they have a very serious point.
When you look in the mirror, who do you see?
Now, I realise I am on very sensitive territory here. But how we see ourselves is critically important. After all, we are who we are with when we have no-one else. If we can’t enjoy our own company, then we won’t enjoy anyone else’s.
I’m also aware of my own weaknesses in this area. My face, and my body, did not fit for years. I was a bit of a geek. An outsider. I listened too much to other people’s opinions of me. I knew I wasn’t strong. I knew I wasn’t stunningly handsome. I knew I had a weak hand when it came to the ladies. And it hurt.
So what I'm about to present to you is not a theological theory. Not at all. This is a personal battle. And these truths are truths I wish I had taken to heart around thirty-five years ago.
They would certainly have helped me avoid years of pain and self-doubt.
The first of these truths is this: God made you.
Maybe you’re thinking ‘Well, that’s not such a great revelation, Paul. I know that.’
But here’s the thing. God did not churn you out off a factory assembly line. Assembly lines have many products that look identical, but sometimes the processes don’t work and some are rejected.
You are neither a factory-assembled product or a reject.
I want you to pay close attention to two verses now. Really close attention:
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
Genesis 1:27 NIV
God made you to resemble Him. God made you in His image. Purposefully. Deliberately.
That image may have been marred by the Fall, but the intention remains.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
Psalms 139:14 NIV
Do you know what those words ‘fearfully’ and ‘wonderfully’ mean?
‘Fearfully’ means something that would cause you to stand back and admire it in awe: like a beautiful landscape or sunset or artwork.
‘Wonderfully’ means something set apart, special, unique, one of a kind.
That is what God thinks of you. That is who God made you.
He made you to be a one of a kind work of awe that reflects His image and His glory.
If you struggle with self-image as much as I did, I want you to pause for a second to meditate on that precious fact.
Right away, that makes a huge difference to how you treat yourself.
Imagine if you walked into someone’s house and they were using a Van Gogh as a table cloth, or a Da Vinci as a napkin, or Michelangelo as a hat stand. Would you not be shocked? Would you not be alarmed? Would you not yell at them, ‘What are you doing? That piece of art is immensely valuable!’
Friend, look at yourself in the mirror. You are God’s work of art. He looks at you and says that the way He made you is very good.
Don’t you think you should take care of yourself?
I believe the Bible points the finger at the source of all our pain when it comes to poor self image. Of course, the way other people treat us and value us has a huge bearing on this.
But another reason is one of the most corrosive sins: that of covetousness.
The Ten Commandments are absolutely clear: for anyone who wants to follow God, covetousness is out (Exodus 20:17; Deuteronomy 5:21).
What if we don’t covet our neighbour’s possessions, but covet their figure or their abilities or their position in life, or even their gender?
That is still covetousness.
And it is that covetousness – that wholly false comparison with other people – which leads to poor self image and a lack of love for ourselves.
That is why, before all else, we must understand that God made us, that we are His work of art, and that He made us who we are for His specific purpose.
As well as the truth that God made you, we see the second truth that God sees you.
Now, I live in a country renowned for its use of CCTV. I’ve been in other countries like Singapore and South Korea that also make extensive use of it, as well as even more intrusive technologies like facial recognition. Someone of us have become quite afraid that a state which sees so much could easily turn against us.
That is not what we are talking about here.
The concept of God seeing us is ancient. It begins with Hagar, running away from her abusive mistress Sarai into the desert. There she meets with God, who encourages her and sends her back to her mistress (Genesis 16). She named the well where God met with her Beer Lahar Roi, meaning ‘the well of the living One who sees me’. In other words, someone who observed her position, cared about it and was willing to do something about it.
Another woman, this time seemingly overlooked by her husband, attributed the birth of her first son to the Lord seeing her distress (Genesis 29:32).
The concept continues into the Exodus, where God speaks these words to Moses:
The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.
Exodus 3:7 NIV
The concept of God watching over His people for their good is rife throughout the Old Testament:
The Lord watches over you— the Lord is your shade at your right hand; the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm— he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
Psalms 121:5-8 NIV
And also in the beautiful Psalm 139, where we find this often neglected, but wonderful, verse:
How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you.
Psalms 139:17-18 NIV
Children in my day used to show off in class because they were seeking attention.
Nowadays, they tend to do the most insane things on social media, or dress extravagantly, or behave horribly (to their detriment and that of other people) for the same reason. And, believe me, people from Christian backgrounds are not at all immune.
What a difference it makes that the Lord sees us! That we have His attention. That He is watching over us.
As well as creating you and seeing you, the third truth is that God knows you.
And how deep is that knowledge:
You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely.
Psalms 139:1-4 NIV
In fact, He knows us even better than we know ourselves. Look at what Jesus said:
Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.
Matthew 10:29-31 NIVUK
So often in life, confusions and misunderstandings are due to people not really knowing us and not really knowing our intentions.
But God knows us. He knows every tiny nook and cranny of our hearts. Nothing is hidden from Him (Hebrews 4:13).
There are no misunderstandings with God.
As well as the truth that God made you, sees you and knows you, we see that God loves you.
You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:6-8 NIV
We live in a culture where many things are cheap and disposable, and therefore of very little value; where goods that once lasted a lifetime now last for only a few years.
The reason for this is obvious. Manufacturers make more money if the things they sell us don’t last long, and even more if they can sell us warranties for less than the expected life span of the goods.
So essentially, we are buying lower quality for lower prices more often, and fouling our environment with the goods we throw away.
Nowadays, relationships and people are often treated as if they are disposable. They bother us. They trouble us. They are not fun anymore. So we throw them away. We dispose of them.
And here’s the thing: the Bible teaches that we are sinners. That means we are sub-standard. Not good enough. We don’t make the grade. The image of God in us has been so marred that we are like a broken mirror.
The Bible teaches that even the best of us is worthy of being disposed of.
But it also teaches that God, in His love, did not do that.
The price you are willing to pay for something reflects the value placed upon it. That much is obvious.
Well, God paid the ultimate price for you.
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
1 John 4:10 NIV
And it is His love for you that drove Him to do it.
It is this love that leads to the offer of reconciliation between you and God (Colossians 1:19-20).
It is this love that will not let you go, and from which nothing can separate you (Romans 8:38-39).
Chasing the love of other humans is a foolish game. The Bible is clear: real, true, agape love is never deserved or earned. It just loves, regardless of the merit or not of its subject (1 Corinthians 13).
Because that is how God loves you: despite who you are, not because of it.
As well as God creating you, seeing you, knowing you and loving you, the fifth truth is that God saved you.
At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Saviour appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Saviour, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.
Titus 3:3-7 NIVUK
I’m sure we have all seen cartoons when a number of precious objects are falling and a character does their best to catch them. They do that because these objects are important and valuable and special.
Well, God saved you.
And the price He paid to save you was way bigger than just stretching out his arms. Because when He stretched out His arms, they banged nails through His hands.
You save something you cherish. You save something you value. You do not save something you can do without. You do not save something of little value. You do not save something disposable.
God saved us not because we had done something of value, but in spite of the fact that we did not.
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no-one can boast.
Ephesians 2:8-9 NIVUK
There is nothing we could do to deserve being saved. We need to be saved precisely because we don’t deserve it. And the reason why we are saved by Jesus is because He made us, sees us, knows us and yet He loves us.
But there is one last truth: God wants you to be better. God wants you to improve. And He works with you for this purpose:
Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed – not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence – continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfil his good purpose.
Philippians 2:12-13 NIVUK
This truth is confusing for some people. ‘How can God love me as I am, yet want me to be better?’
But it’s much simpler than it sounds.
Imagine, for example, that you are the parent of a child who has just finished their first day of school. You don’t meet them at the school gates and start to ask them about Pythagoras’ Theorem? They would probably think a hypoteneuse is an African animal.
You wouldn’t ask them about how the First World War started. They would probably think Archduke Franz Ferdinand was the name of a racehorse.
You wouldn’t ask them about Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. They would probably ask you if it was something to do with why their grandmother is your mother.
No, you let them grow up first. You encourage them. You help them. You do what you can to enable them. But every child needs to grow.
It’s like that with us. None of us is fully mature. We are not there yet. We all have room to grow. And God sends His Holy Spirit to help us with this like a cane supports a tomato vine.
The important thing is that we grow:
Then we will no longer be infants, tossed to and fro by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.
Ephesians 4:14-15 NIVUK
And God wants us to grow so that we lose our taste for the harmful temptations and sins that beset us, just like a parent longs for their children to grow out of bad, immature habits.
That is how God loves us as we are, but He wants us to get better.
There is much in this world that conspires to make us feel worse about ourselves. One of the most heinous truths is that advertisers deliberately set out to do this so they can sell us their product to make us feel better about ourselves. They have no idea of the harm they are doing.
Let me tell you, you will free yourselves from so much self-doubt and despair if you simply stop looking in the mirror and seeing something negative.
Instead, see yourself as someone designed and built by God, seen by Him, known by Him, loved by Him, saved by Him, and someone He is working on day by day to make you better.
Romans 8 contains these pivotal verses:
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Romans 8:28 NIVUK
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:38-39 NIVUK
If we took these verses really seriously, then how we see ourselves would change dramatically.
And how we relate to other people would change with it.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me to see that how I see myself matters. Help me not to think badly of the person You created me to be or to long to be someone else. Help me instead to seek to be the best version of me I can be for Your sake. Amen.
Questions
1. What do think of yourself? Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
2. Why does how we think of ourselves matter?
3. How can you have a healthier opinion of yourself? How can this meditation help you with that?
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