Today’s Word: BELIEVE
Today’s Time of Stillness: 8 minutes
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. – Psalm 139:13-14
My neighbor has a great Christmas banner that hangs by her front door. It simply says “Believe.” It’s a gentle, glittery reminder to me every time I make the turn on to our street to smile, to wonder, to believe.
There’s something in the air at Christmas that inspires belief. Belief that creative and industrious elves with insane connections to your Amazon wish list are working overtime on your behalf. Belief that the unfortunate parking lot incident that moved you to your insurance company’s Naughty list surely won’t tip the scales for Santa’s list as well. Even, and especially, belief in one another; that we can be better, kinder, more compassionate.
I heard a song on the radio the other day. From the first line I was captured by the words; words of the wrong kind of belief, of self-doubt and discouragement. Words that I’ve heard far too often, in one form or another, from people I care about. Words that I’ve sometimes said to myself.
The song is You Say by Lauren Daigle, and it opens this way:
Every single lie that tells me I will never measure up
Am I more than just the sum of every high and every low?
Remind me once again just who I am, because I need to know
Have you ever been there? Beating yourself up? Letting tapes of past mistakes play over and over in your head?
While it is hardly a Christmas song, You Say is a song of faith. Of believing.
You say I am held when I am falling short
When I don’t belong, oh You say that I am Yours
And I believe, oh I believe
What You say of me
I believe
If you struggle with believing that you are enough, if you keep feeling like your mistakes define you or that you just don’t measure up, my prayer for you this Christmas is that you believe.
Believe in elves and Santa and candy canes if it brings a smile to your face.
Believe in the coming of God in the birth of the Christ child because it changes everything.
Believe the truth of what God says about you. Let it drown out the other voices in your head. You are made in the image of God – beautiful, beloved, whole. You are loved with an everlasting love. You are more than enough.
Do you believe?
