Day 108- You Matter

📖Daily Reading

Psalms 139-140 

 

📝 Reflection 

Psalm 139: 17-18

“How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me!”

 

Have you ever stopped to think about the fact that God thinks about you?  This psalm also talks about the oft quoted ‘..you knit me together in my mother’s womb…’. I think many of us have heard this but have you really ‘heard it’ with your heart?  Have you pondered it, received it, and live as if it is true? If we can take our human understanding of love and think about how much we love members of our family, we know that they matter, and we hope that we love them well enough that they know how much they matter to us, right? But do we stop to reflect as David did and is role modeling about how much God loves us?  So much that he created you, he doesn’t just respond and relate to you, he literally created you!

When we begin to grasp this, it can and should be life changing.  Hopefully it can also change how we treat ourselves and others for the better. As I am on my spiritual walk I am beginning to look at self care as a spiritual discipline.  When I talk about self care, I am not talking about self indulgence and spa days, getting manicures etc.. Also, if you are in a season of life where you are considering a trip to the grocery store or even a trip to the bathroom by yourself as self care, then we also need to chat! When we are truly caring for ourselves by getting good rest, allowing margin in our days, eating an appropriate amount of nourishing food, getting enough movement etc.. we tend to have less drama in our lives, or at least I do. 

I am starting to connect the dots! You matter because God matters and also because your vessel of life is also a vessel for his Holy Spirit. So it is a balance of not thinking too much of yourself or thinking of yourself too much, but also not too little either. You matter and I matter because God matters. We matter because we are a precious creation of a generous and loving creator. I was a tennis player for a long time and in tennis we talk about the ‘sweet spot’ of the racquet. You know it when it happens, when the ball makes contact with the racquet at just the right spot, and you conversely know when you don’t hit it too.  It takes a lot of hours of practice and muscle memory to hit that more often than not. I think for those of us new to the concept of self care it will be the same. We aren’t always going to get it right, but with practice, time, grace, humility, a willing and open spirit we can develop in this discipline. 

Not only will you get better at self discipline, but I believe you will also begin to see how it plays a supporting role in your spiritual growth and maturity as well. When we aren’t caught up in the dramas of our own making, which usually involve an aspect of lack of the self care discipline then we are free to use that energy to be who God called us to be and also seeing and encouraging the same in others. For example, I did a lot of new and big things in my businesses last week, but getting so focused on my work, I let a few of my daily self care habits go.  This eventually created in my body and mind a sense of overwhelm and tiredness, which guess what naturally also created a bit of grumpiness, wanting to just be left alone, which then caused my husband to feel rejected and a bit resentful which then caused me to be defensive … you see where I am going with this. So can you see by this one of thousands of examples I could give you personally how we can trace a lack of proper self care back to the true source of a disconnection. How much time we lost in our disconnection and trying to get back on track - when if I had taken the little bit of extra time each day to slow down and practice self care, I could have saved us both a lot of time and energy. This is why we need to think of self care more as a discipline and a necessity, not just a nice to have or something you have to earn or deserve…When you treat yourself as if you don’t matter and accept this from others, it comes out eventually, as you can see from my own example just in the last 24 hrs. 

You exist and there for you matter. God says you matter that is all the earning you have to do! It is to take care of him and allow His Holy Spirit to work effectively and powerfully in your life, when you don’t you block this! In your efforts to be good, and earn brownie points from your people, you are blocking the greatness of God and you aren’t providing the best ‘home’ for him to reside in. We also don’t want to be so self absorbed and indulgent and mistaking this for self care, this leads to indolence and also blocks God. It is a sweet spot of recognizing you matter not because of anything you have done do earn it in and of yourself, but because of who created you and who resides in you and who has the power to work in and through you when you cooperate with him fully. 

Jesus was the best role model and example of this, he withdrew all the time to spend time with His Father. He was able to serve from a place of overflow. This magnified his ministry not diminished it. We must simplify to amplify and magnify. In God’s upside down and paradoxical ways, when we take more time with the essentials we have more time.  Give it a try, but also give yourself grace in the trying, especially if you are newer to self care like me, it feels uncomfortable and selfish in the beginning until you start to connect the dots like I am. Others in your world who aren’t used to you caring for yourself may not like it at first either, give them grace as well. It takes a while to learn a new ‘dance’, that is why we call it a discipline and a practice. Eventually everyone will benefit from the you that knows that you matter and treats yourself accordingly, but mostly God and God’s plan and kingdom will be impacted to a greater degree because you are unleashing your fuller potential and thereby His by knowing you matter and are worthy of being disciplined and caring for yourself. 

 

Matthew 22: 37-40

Jesus replied, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important; ‘ Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.” 

 

 

✍🏼Daily Journal Prompt 

I would argue that I can’t love God fully and with all my heart, soul and mind if it isn’t functioning and being cared for properly. At least this is true for me at the stage of maturity I am at in my walk.  Since I have begun practicing better self care I have seen nothing but improvement in my life and my relationships. Like I said I am slowly connecting the dots. My first and greatest act of self care was to put down the wine glass. If you are also consuming alcohol on a regular basis I would challenge you to consider how this is helping you in your life? I know it was something that was blocking and draining me of life.  I would love to hear your perspective and experience.  

📖Tomorrows Reading

Psalms 141-144 

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