(Proverbs 4:23 GNB) Be careful how you think; your life is shaped by your thoughts.
- We let culture define who we are.
- We let our past define who we are.
(Romans 12:3 NIV) For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.
- Highly – an improper
- Sober – having a right mind.
- Faith – a belief and security about what God thinks about you and how He sees you.
- You’ll never be right until you can
see right.
OVERCOMING INSECURITY
(Judges 6:11-24 NIV) The angel of the LORD came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. When the angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon, he said, “The LORD is with you, mighty warrior.” “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the LORD bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the LORD has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.” The LORD turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?” “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.” The LORD answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.” …So Gideon built an altar to the LORD there and called it The LORD Is Peace.
- See God correctly.
(Psalms 59:10 LB) My God is changeless in his love for me.
- See myself the way God sees me.
(1 Peter 2:9 NLT) But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for He called you out of the darkness into His wonderful light.
- Get around people who see me
the way God sees me.
(Proverbs 27:17 NKJV) As iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.
- Right relationships help us define who we are and
what we become.