Luke 10:27 Challenge: With All Your Soul, Day 3

God Created You Just as He Wanted You to Be

He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Luke 10:27 NIV

When God created you, He had a plan.  He knew exactly who He was creating.  Not only did He know your hair and eye color, but He knew the person you would be inside and out.  He created your soul.

  Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,

   before you were born I set you apart;

   I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah 1:5

You are Enough

The God who created the entire world from nothing, who imagined everything and then made it be, also put thought into exactly who He wanted you to be.  That is just how he created you.  The funny thing is that we often spend so much time trying to be someone else. The truth is you are enough.  

You don’t need to be taller, thinner, smarter, more athletic, or more artistic.  You don’t have to be more successful, happier, or younger.  You just have to be the you that God created you to be.  We didn’t decide who that person was.  But we do have to decide to embrace that person and love ourselves.  When we are fully ourselves, not worried about what others think, we are exactly where God wants us to be.  

Yet you, Lord, are our Father.

   We are the clay, you are the potter;

   we are all the work of your hand.” Isaiah 64:8 NIV

Loving God with All Your Soul

When you love God with all your soul, you don’t hold back.  “All” means “all!”  Don’t neglect the unique gifts, talents, and even challenges that you have been given.  God wants all of you.  

For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10 NIV

What Does this Mean for Parents?

We need to model embracing who we are.  Kids need to do the same. We often have ideas of who we think our children should be.  Our ideas aren’t always the same as God’s. He has a plan for everyone.  Sometimes we just need to step back and let our kids be who God created them to be.  Our job is to love and to shepherd, NOT to mold.  That part has already been taken care of.  (See Isaiah 64:8 above.)

Are you comfortable with who God created you to be?  Do you have a hard time letting your children express their true selves?   

 

 

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