I am not; I am

For years, my mom would tell me to "speak words of life". For a few years, starting when I was about 7 or 8 and ending when I was 11, I had a tendency to be negative about everything. Those years were pretty rough for me, and honestly--I'm probably the one at fault. I never said anything positive. I became closeted and angry. I didn't know at who or about what, but I lived inside a self-constructed prison of negativity and self-beration. Um, yeah, not a fabulous world to create for myself.

Starting in 2009, God began to really get a hold of my heart. He was laying the foundations for what would happen this spring (my true realization of Christianity). This was already several years after my seemingly unshakable bad attitude finally dissolved. So I don't remember exactly when it was, but my pastor gave a sermon on our identities. In a nutshell, he said that we needed to stop living inside the lies of who the world declares us as. Instead, we need to live in the truth of who God knows we are.

So instead of saying, "I'm just a girl. I'm not worth anything. I can't change anything. I'm meaningless and unimportant. I'm not special." -- I should be saying positive things about who God made me to be. He crafted me with great care, forming me with His loving hands.

But now, O Lord, You are our Father;

we are the clay, and You are the potter;

and all we are the work of Your hand.

~ Isaiah 64:8 (NKJV)

God knew what He was doing when He made me. He made me to serve and love Him. And when I do, He will do great things through me, just as He can do great things through you as well. Words are inadequate to describe His glory. As A. W. Tozer once said,

Always remember this: God is always bigger than anything God can say, because words are inadequate to express God and what God can do.

I love this quote. But anyways. My pastor gave that sermon, and it took awhile for it to really sink in. I had always thought of myself as "Anna the Useless" or "Anna the Follower", but then one day God revealed to me that I was exactly the opposite of what I had believed--I am not an unimportant pushover. I am "Anna the Useful" and "Anna the Leader". Through Christ, I have the ability to move mountains and see my world change.

So the other night, a holy discontent welled up within me. I may not be able to solve world hunger or eliminate poverty, but I sure as heck can pray my soul out. I can raise awareness for issues that burden me. I can work with the hungry and the poor in my area. But before I can do that, I must have a vision. I must know what God wants for me. And even before I can know that, I must know who God created me to be. So after the holy discontent, I wrote a brief paragraph to myself. In it I included words of life that feed God's power within me and terminate the lies that I had so willfully taken in the past. Here it is:

I am NOT "just a girl" from Anytown, USA.

I am a child of God - a daughter of the King -

with a vision and a dream. And that counts for

more than just "something"; it counts for everything.

I can - and WILL - make a difference in 

this world for the glory of God.

And there you have it. It speaks truth about my life and projects God's power into my future. Let me tell you, I am going to be keeping this near and dear to my heart. Come to think of it, I think we all should have one of these. I encourage you to write one for yourself. Find out what God has placed on your heart. I'm not saying that you have to know what your life's work will be. All I'm asking is, what is bothering you right now? Homelessness? Illness? What is it? Find it. Pray about it. Then act upon it.

What's your burden for today? What does your "power statement" say?