How I See Myself

The other day I woke up at 2:30 am and couldn’t go back to sleep. I started perusing FaceBook. I decided to look for a particular person (the aunt of my ex-husband) who I knew I hadn’t seen on my timeline in a while, but she was expecting her first grand baby and I wanted to see if her joy had made it’s debut.

Low and behold I discovered that she had “unfriended” me on FaceBook. It was a shock. Why? Because she had sent me a friend request years ago and then decided she wanted to unfriend me without saying anything. I was kind of hurt. Wow! I rolled over and tried to get back into a fitful sleep.

I woke up later and talked to Mr. C about the situation and he said “Don’t worry about it babe.” I explained to him that I’m not really worried about it, I just was shocked. I couldn’t understand the motive behind it. It was disturbing.

I told Mr. C that many of my exes friends and now family had unfriended me on Facebook, but none of the 30 plus of my friends and family had done that to him. I said “I guess it speaks to the caliber of friends and family that God has allowed in my life. My people didn’t take sides and just existed and loved us both.” He said, “Yeah, but you don’t need to let that bother you.”

We followed our normal morning process by reading the devotional and having prayer. But, when I tell you that God was speaking to me through that devotional I started to have a holy ghost fit. His word was:

Beware of seeing yourself through other people’s eyes. There are several dangers with this practice. First of all, it is nearly impossible to discern what other’s actually think of you. Moreover, their views of you are variable subject to each viewer’s spiritual, emotional and physical condition. The major problem of letting others define you is that it borders idolatry. Your concern to please others dampens your desire to please your Creator. 

It is much more real to see yourself through God’s eyes. God’s gaze upon you is steady and sure, untainted by sin. Through God’s eyes you can see yourself as one who is deeply and eternally loved. Rest in God’s loving gaze and you will receive deep peace. Respond to God’s loving presence by worshiping in spirit and in truth.

-Sarah Young “Jesus Calling”

I had my Aha moment! You see that right? God was telling me to stop worrying about how other’s see me and to focus on Him. He was blessing me where I stood and I was worried about someone that I shouldn’t be. But, God.

God, has a way of smacking me in my face with His word when he realizes that I’m concentrating on the wrong things. I was getting smacked ya’ll. He was telling me why are you worrying about man when your eyes should be on me? Your heart, your mind and your spirit should be focused on what I’m doing for you so that you can feel the peace of me.

Good God!

I said “I got it God” and got off the phone. I got showered and dressed and headed to work. I turned my radio to the local gospel station Praise 104.1 and was listening to Erica Campbell say how she saw this great post on her friend’s Instagram page and she wanted to share it. You know what it was that she read?

The same exact piece.

I just said “Thank you God. I get it!” He is blessing me in so many ways that I can’t even begin to explain. He’s increasing my territory and removing people and things out of my life that are not of Him. He is working on me and through me. I just need to get out of my own way.

I was being vain worrying about someone else’s motives behind what they did to me. People have the right to follow, unfollow and unfriend who they want. I need to stop worrying or caring about those trivial things and focus on what His will is for me. Man is fickle, but ya’ll God is forever and unmoved by the shadiness of folks.