What God Sees

"God saw all that He had made, and it was very good." - Genesis 1:31

My fiance always tells me I see the glass as half-empty and this past week my good friend told me I'm neurotic. They don't mean it in a bad way but they know me well enough to know that I can have a beautiful, white canvas and obsess over the one, small speck on it. I'm very hard on myself. Anything less than perfect is a failure to me, and this attitude doesn't translate so well for me in my relationship with God. I have trouble accepting that God loves me because I have my sins and my shortcomings always before my eyes. And, if I am such a horrible sinner, how could He love me? This is where I start obsessing!

But I'm trying to let God's love soak into my soul, and I hope that any of you who struggle the way I do can do the same. When Jesus said that we need to love one another as we love ourselves, that implies we need to love ourselves and not be so hard on ourselves. More importantly, in faith we say God is all-powerful and all-knowing, so shouldn't He have known who He was creating when He created me? When He was creating you? Flaws and all, He created us and He said it was "very good." As my friend also said, if we focus on just the sin, then we can't see the beauty of the good God has created in us. Yes, there is so much good in us! As hard as it is for me to accept myself with the good and the bad, I can't deny that God knows what He's doing, and if He molded me and liked what He saw, then I need to respect His work. I pray that all of you also learn to look at yourselves, even at your lowest points, as the work of God's hands. God thought of you and formed you just the way you are, and He saw that it was very good.

Today's Prayer:
Father, help me to love myself as You love me. I know that it doesn't matter if I fail as long as I keep on getting up and turning towards You. You are not as hard on me as I am on myself. Help me to accept Your love and accept myself. In Jesus' Name we pray, amen.