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“Oh, don’t worry; we wouldn’t dare say that we are as wonderful as these other men who tell you how important they are! But they are only comparing themselves with each other, using themselves as the standard of measurement. How ignorant!” – 2 Corinthians 10:12,
It is not uncommon to hear the phrase “he (she) just doesn’t ‘measure up’”? When someone doesn’t “measure up” that means he or she is not quite good enough. Most everyone I know wants to feel good about themselves. We want to feel like we are going somewhere, moving forward in life, and accomplishing something. We want to feel we measure up. But that can prove to be difficult when we feel like we are “less than,” rather than “greater than” the people around us. They are smarter, prettier, more athletic, more successful, taller, thinner, wealthier, and more likable than we are. Fortunately, God loves the less than as well as the greater than people. Galatians 3:28 says, “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.” And Acts 10:34 says, “Then Peter replied, “I see very clearly that God shows no favoritism.”
For those who believe they don’t measure up remember this: Our real or perceived limitations are not prohibitions to God using us to further His kingdom. You may be thinking, “I can’t do that because of… or I’m not smart enough, I don’t have the spiritual training, I’m not bold enough, or, I don’t know the Bible well enough.”
God specializes in using ordinary people to do extraordinary things. The pages of Scripture are filled with ordinary people. Fishermen, prostitutes, people that are uneducated, people that other people reject. And God specializes in taking ordinary, regular people of average intelligence and average skills and gifts and doing something extraordinary. For an extraordinary thing to happen through an ordinary person like each of us, something has to happen. And it is not dependent on your intelligence, it’s not dependent on your education, your giftedness, your background, your wealth, or your personality. This one thing is available to every one of us.
That one thing is faith. It’s believing God. Faith and trust in God will overcome all your limitations because God is bigger than your limitations and your circumstances.This is the kind of faith we need: a faith that results in a transformed life. The greatest accomplishments for believers happen only by faith.
Discussion Questions:
- How can God help us measure up?
- What is the role of faith in helping us measure up?