spencerandlynseyball - Flaws and all...

Flaws and all...

There are few things in life that I dislike as much as having my picture taken. I don't recall at what age I began hating pictures but, if you were to look through my old family photo albums you would notice a major gap in my life. I can't attribute this change to a major event in life, or some sort of dramatic event, I just began disliking who I was, how I looked, and even how I sounded.

Simply put, I began hating myself.

Can you relate? Have you or do you ever just hate yourself? Maybe not everything about yourself, but something.

Sadly this is the case for far too many of us. Instead of focusing on the good within ourselves, we tend to focus on the negative, even when the negative is imagined.

As I look at the picture above I notice a few things:

I have a beautiful family.
We are all unique and were made to be that way.
We are not perfect, but we are not supposed to be perfect.
And, even when we are looking the wrong way, forgetting to smile, or picking our eye, we are still beautiful to God.

It took me a long time to realize that I was not made to be perfect, act perfect, look perfect, or even sound perfect. It took me many years after becoming a Christian to realize that:

God loves me, flaws and all.

God does not require me to be perfect. He desires me to be good, but there is only One who is perfect, and I am not He.

As my family prepares to move to Romania I am proud to say, we will not be perfect. In fact, I believe we will make a lot of mistakes. Yet Scripture tells me that we (not just my family but all of us) are to praise God because:

"...I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." Psalm 139:14

God's Word also tells us that:

"...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

Knowing and accepting that I do not need to be perfect is freeing. It allows me to try to do things even when there's a good chance I will fail. It allows me to to run around Lego Land sword fighting my son without caring what others think. Knowing God does not expect me to be perfect allows me to do things that I cannot do without Him, and to give Him all of the glory and honor when He is successful through me.

So rejoice! We don't have to be perfect. Embrace God's love. Embrace your uniqueness. Fail often trying to do your best, knowing that you are fearfully and wonderfully made, the workmanship of God the Father!