Believe In yourself

“Believe in yourself”...that’s the poster I pensively stared at for several minutes while waiting to meet one of the awesome educators at my kids school this morning . The poster message, which seems harmless enough is our message these days ...our human attempt to give a word of positive encouragement to boost the confidence of our youth who struggle with their worth. Then it occurred to me how ineffective this approach would be to a person with little confidence.

Hear me out: if you have no confidence in yourself and feel worthless...what good is it to have a person you’ve decided is worthless(you) believing in your own ability? Kind of a catch 22 actually.

Consider two different people telling you they believe in you...the first is a low IQ methhead who you caught stealing your property and then bragged about it on social media ( a person you might deem worthless right??) The second is a highly successful and generous person whom you highly respect , they’ve achieved much in life, carry themselves with confidence, treat people well and are well liked by everyone. Which one conveying their confidence or “belief” in you would carry more weight??

You see the catch 22 in telling a kid with no confidence to “believe in themself”? Logically the net effect is zero for the low confidence kids you’re trying to reach. So perhaps instead we let them know that God loves them, in fact He loves them so much that He died for them. Let them know He has a plan and purpose for them. Yes, the same God who created everything around us with His Word, created the sun , the stars and the moon!!...that’s something that should give everyone confidence!

If you’re reading this now and you’ve yet to submit your life to Christ, still banking on your own ability to boost your confidence...today’s a good day to surrender that job. You’re enough...not cause I believe in you or you believe in yourself but cause God looked at you as worthy of saving and His Word is the only one that counts. What are you waiting for??