Many things can hinder us from seeing ourselves as God sees us. He calls us to learn to see ourselves the way He does!
Your True Personal Identity as a Child of God
Little children love to play dress up.
Little girls dig through their mom’s closet to find old prom dresses, high heels, and tiaras. They eagerly don the latest princess or superhero costume.
Little boys run around with a Superman cape or Spiderman mask wildly wielding sticks that subdue the enemy.
Children somehow sense in their spirits the world needs saving and ruling. Before the carnal world pours discouragement on their spirits, they innately sense their identity as royal sons and daughters of God!
They know they exist for a majestic purpose.
From the beginning, we were created in the image of God as royal children of God. However, in and through the Great Fall, sin corrupted the image in each of us.
That fateful day in the Garden unleashed a tangled mess of fear, confusion, and rejection.
Since that time, we humans have struggled with self-image.
We focus on ourselves—what we look like, what we do, how well we do it, and how we compare to other people. We create our own image and try to maintain ideas about who we are, so that others will love and accept us.
All of us have distorted and injured self-identities to some extent, simply because we were born in sin, separated from God.
We see ourselves through our sin nature, and that’s not how God sees us.
“It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living” (Eph 1:11-12 MSG).
How Do You See Yourself?
Self-identity, as psychologists understand the concept, begins to form early in life, and is constructed from various sources.
You have a particular name and were born to your distinct parents in a certain culture, in a particular time and place.
And you are born with a specific kinship, race, and ethnicity, and you maintain certain religious beliefs and cultural traditions. Then you may also identify yourself socially by your type of work, vocation, social group, or affiliation.
These things bring definition and a sense of belonging in life, and they all influence how you see yourself.
Your personal identity also consists of your personal DNA plus your personal will, your thoughts, feelings, the dreams in your heart, and the image of God (the immense God-given potential) inside you.
When we were children, we thought of ourselves in a certain way, but as we grow emotionally, physically, and spiritually, our ideas also grow and change.
However, the image of God inside us never changes!
The image of God inside us only gets discovered, uncovered, and more and more evident!
When we encounter God, He calls us to see ourselves the way He sees us.
He called Abram to see himself as Abraham (the father of many nations),
He called Simon to see himself as Peter (a spiritual rock), and He called Saul to see himself as the apostle Paul.
Our Christian discipleship goal is to grow spiritually until our own ideas of who we are match up with God’s ideas of who we are.
God Sees You As His Beloved Son or Daughter
Friend, from the beginning, your heavenly Creator Father divinely and intentionally planned you, then set you in the palm of His hand and artistically formed you in His image.
He breathed into you His Spirit breath to make you alive (Gen 1:27).
You are not an accident or a mistake.
You are not a blob of tissue.
Whatever the circumstances of your birth, you were intentionally planned and loved by your Creator Father in heaven!
God sees you as loved, valued, and cherished!
You are God’s masterpiece, and all of heaven rejoices! [1]
God intended to bring you strategically into this world at this time and place, with your specific talents and abilities, in your specific culture.
How Can I See Myself as God Sees Me?
What if you were identified by your inner person? Who would you be?
In other words, could you define yourself without relying on social and cultural contexts?
Could you define who you are without defining what you do?
And what if you were not identified as single or married, a husband or wife, brown-haired or blue-haired, green-eyed or blue-eyed?
What if you were not identified as a student, a teacher, boss, construction worker, banker, accountant, artist, or musician? Or what if you were not identified as black, white, or brown?
We live in a sin-soaked world and the image of God inside us gets buried.
However, through the process of growing in our intimate relationship with our Creator God, we begin to see ourselves the ways He sees us.
We begin to see ourselves through His eyes of everlasting, unconditional love!
And we uncover the royal child of God we were created to be!
There are a few things that can hinder us from seeing ourselves as God sees us and we will look at those now.
7 Things That Hinder Us from Seeing Ourselves As God Sees Us!
1. Can You Feel God’s Love?
For a variety of reasons, some people simply can’t feel God’s love. They may feel His love through other people, and yet may not know how to recognize what God’s love feels like for themselves.
We all desire to feel His love in a greater measure!
✔️My prayer for you: Lord Jesus, I ask you to cover your child with your precious blood and wash them from the horrible things that have come between You and Your child. Melt all the disappointments, hurts, and fears right now. Bring down the walls. Loose them to be able to feel Your love. I pray the peace of God on them right now! In Jesus’ name. Amen!
2. Lack of Knowledge & Understanding of God’s Word
The primary way to see yourself as God sees you is to consume large amounts of His Spirit-words in the Bible.
When you put His words in you, His word washes, renews, and restores you to what He intended from the beginning.
You begin to think the way He thinks and see the way He sees!
3. Fear That You Are Not Good Enough
The enemy can overwhelm people with the idea that they are not good enough for God’s love.
They begin to think they have been too bad and do not deserve forgiveness, peace, or happiness. They may even say things like, “If you knew what I’ve done.”
Jesus died so that all of us could be free from condemnation, shame, and inferiority!
None of us are good enough, BUT Jesus Christ is good enough!
And He took your sin on Himself when He died on the cross that you could be FREE!
✔️My prayer for you: Jesus, I pray you will cover this reader with your blood and free them from condemnation, shame, and inferiority! Wrap them up in Your love and heal their heart. I speak healing to their heart! Thank you, Jesus!
Now forgive yourself and others, then pray the prayer again in your own words.
4. A Negative Mindset Keeps Us from Seeing Ourselves as God Sees Us
Sometimes we get caught up in thinking negatively and see our lives through a cloudy lens. Some people‘s inner self-talk is negative all the time.
This will absolutely cloud the way you see God and the way you see yourself!
To overcome a cloudy lens, you will have to begin to change the way you think. God’s thoughts toward you are good! He has a wonderful future for you in your identity, purpose, and relationships!
✔️What are you thinking about most of the time, and how does it affect your well-being?
✔️I challenge you to do, say, or write something for which you are thankful every day for a month (or longer) as part of a strategy to begin to change your negative mindset.
5. Judgment Hinders Us From Seeing Ourselves Like God Sees Us
Similar to having a negative mindset is having a judgmental attitude.
When we constantly judge ourselves and other people our thinking is polluted and cloudy.
We as humans do not judge righteously.
The sin nature we are born into taints our judgment. Only when we judge in alignment with the way God judges is our judgment clear.
When we pass judgment on ourselves or another person, we usurp God’s authority to judge.
God is the only one who judges rightly. He sees all the layers of issues involved in a situation. And He knows all the heart motives of everyone involved and sees the end results of every scenario.
God’s views are much more gracious and merciful than ours, and He is more concerned about inner motives than we are.
It is best to practice asking God what He thinks about every situation.
✔️Ask His view about something that bugs you right now.
What Does God’s Voice Sound LIke?
6. Abusive Authorities Hinder our Seeing Ourselves Positively Like God Sees Us
Many people can’t see how God sees them because they believe a lie that someone told them as a child.
Some people may see themselves based on perceived performance and continue to strive for approval.
Many people are never able to see the beauty of who they are on the inside because they have been in an emotionally toxic environment.
Some people’s identity reflects a self that has been belittled, abused, and/or shamed by others. They can falsely conclude they are worthless and unlovable.
This is NOT how God sees you!
✔️Friend, if this is you, begin to get closer to God. Begin to ask Him about all these things that concern you. He can lead you out of abusive situations and heal the ways you see yourself! Ask Him for help!
7. Lack of Confidence Hinders How We See Ourselves
Some of you may simply lack confidence.
You may have heard God say wonderful things about you.
You may know what His Word says, yet you have not yet begun to live in the reality of those wonderful things.
Friend, keep believing!
Prayer is key here! Learn to recognize His presence and hear learn to hear Him speak to you with greater clarity and in longer conversations.
✔️ Ask the Lord for encouragement! And ask Him to show you the way He sees you!
He will answer in one way or another!
In conclusion, friends, you do not deserve to continue through life with a corrupted self-image.
All the lies or distortions about how you see yourself will disintegrate as you learn and grow in your relationship with Christ and His presence.
?It is in His presence we begin to trade our distorted self-image for His glorious image.?
We lose the corrupted image and take on the image of Christ, the image of the invisible God. [2]
Remember God Sees You Through Unconditional Love
Jesus, the Son of God, was certain of His Father’s unconditional love and acceptance.
Remember these words at His baptism, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased?”
Likewise, your Creator Father also loves you and says to you,
?“You are My beloved child, in whom I am well pleased.”
God knew exactly what He was doing when He created you.
No matter the circumstances of your birth, God intentionally created you in His image on purpose, for a purpose.
You are a royal child of your Creator Father. God has a purposeful life for you in His kingdom.
You have talents, gifts, wisdom, experience, and abilities unique to you—some of which you have yet to discover.
You have more God-potential inside of you than you can imagine!
✔️Ask Him to begin showing you how He sees you!
For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them. (Ps 139:13-16).
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Related Posts:
- What does God’s presence of love feel like? Step-by-step instructions to help you learn how to feel God’s love to a greater degree.
- Discover Your Divine Purpose For A Satisfying Life
- 3 Keys to Find & Fulfill My Divine Purpose
NOTES:
Thank God for your precious love and teaching Cynthia. Truly God breathed words of love and life. You help fill the gaps needed in my spiritual walk and bless my life just when l need. Praise God for you x Kerin Brown from Glory Faith Family Australia.
Aww, thank you dear Kerin for encouraging me with your comments! I’m so happy the article helped your walk with God! Blessings!
Cynthia,
Thank you for sharing such a loving and wise post. I enjoyed reading it. It was a great message. I feel God was talking to me (and many others) through your post. God bless.