a rewritten soul/ how to be confident

A new friend gathered up her things, put on her jacket, and we all headed out of the restaurant.

“You’re just such a confident person,” she commented. “I can’t imagine you being any other way.”

Really? I can.

We are often unaware of how other people perceive us. The truth of who we are seeps out of our cracks and holes, though, and eventually who we are is an open book to the world around us. A decade ago, she would have seen a different story on the pages of my soul.

Christ followers, people of Jesus, we must worship Him in truth. In the still, quiet darkness of our minds our internal discussion with God’s word writes the tale of who we will become.

The truth of God can rewrite you.

We all bear black holes in our souls. Devoid of matter, those spaces lack truth and definition. They are weak spaces in our identity. Left unprotected, every flaming arrow can securely pass through them. Like a soul-sieve, they leak out all the goodness God means to sustain us.

People can only stand up so long when they are cracked and broken, riddled with black holes. Eventually, we fall.

I am one of the fallen failures, whose dark soul lost sight of all light until I learned to let His truth light my way.

Where I was weak, He has become strong. That is the way of the gospel; the way worshiping God in truth rewrites our souls. 

The truth is that we live for and because of His glory; the truth is that our insecurity is well-earned by our inadequacy in His presence; all our lack and loss is forever trumped by His love for us.

Confidence has been born out of utter desperation for Him. God has never failed me, and He never will. Even when there is a great deal of sorrow and difficulty to endure, I have nothing left to fear.

Many of my black holes are full now. God has filled them with His light, and they are the places the best of Him shines out of my life. 

I am not a confident person. I am not a beautiful person. I am not a wise person. I am not a good wife, mother, friend, or daughter. I am neither a patient, nor a diligent soul. But God is all of those things in me, just as He is all of those things in all of His daughters. He has written Himself into my darkness and His words have made me something new.

I am a rewritten soul, and the center of my story contains one beautiful string of words: glory to God in the highest. And when I live my life the way I am meant to, that is the story it confidently tells the world.