Feeling Left Out? This Is for You . . .
I open the refrigerator in search of milk, but the sticker on the door catches my eye. It reads, “Star Student Award.” The white paper is creased and is very well-loved. The little girl who earned this sticker was feeling left out until the day the teacher handed her the sticker.
She wore it for two days.
The day she earned the sticker, she bounced off the school bus in the blazing heat with a fleece jacket over her shirt.
She said she wanted to surprise me.
She ripped the coat wide open to unveil the prize she’d been longing for all year: the principal’s star student award. My sweet girl was spotted helping a friend, and someone noticed.
I convinced her not to slap it onto her pajamas that night, but she wore it to school the next day, gently pulling it from her turquoise T-shirt and placing it on her purple dress. She was chosen, and she just couldn’t wait to show the world.
After the second day on display, the sticker found its final resting place on an index card. We taped it to the fridge for good measure.
A treasure.
A reminder to be kind.
Feeling Left Out in Places That Matter
Staring at it in the early glow of morning’s rising light, I think of what it means to be chosen. I think of a dozen times when I so desperately longed to be chosen . . . but wasn’t.
The Truth You Need When You Feel Left Out
I turn away from the sticker on the fridge and make my way to the couch.
Opening the Bible, I read, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him” (Ephesians 1:3-4).
Chosen.
I chew on the words.
The God who created the stars and the clouds and the mountains chose me.
He chose me before the foundation of all these things.
I wasn’t always chosen for the team, chosen for the dance, or chosen for the promotion, but God chose me to be his.
I wasn’t always chosen for the team, chosen for the dance, or chosen for the promotion, but God chose me to be his. #identityinChrist #encounteringGod Click To TweetGod chose me, with all my failures, all my besetting sins. He chose me with my quick temper, my stained past, and my addictive personality. Only the cross could have accomplished this. The cross makes me blameless.
For the Woman Who Needs to Know She Is Chosen
Sweet friend, you are not reading these words by accident.
God is pursuing you. He is inviting you to draw close to him. He chooses you.
You might be feeling left out in some area of your life, but your Maker is not overlooking you.
He is calling you to a life of love. And you know what? When you know you are chosen by God, it won’t matter so much when the world rejects you.
You are not called to fit in; you are called to love others.
Embrace your identity as a chosen child of God. Receive Jesus’ love and forgiveness. Ask him to be the Lord and Savior of your life. Humble yourself and tell him you need him.
And then go.
Go and look for someone who is feeling left out. Look for someone who needs your love.
This is how you overcome the less-than feelings that come when you feel overlooked. Give the affirmation you so desperately seek.
~~~
I swallow down the truth, and Bekah comes down the stairs with her hair matted from the pillow.
She walks to the fridge. She runs her little fingers across the sticker. I run my fingers across the pages that remind me of the same thing.
When she folds onto my lap, we talk about the sticker on the fridge, and I read words of life to her, praying they’ll sink straight into her thrumming heart. She smiles wide, the truth sinking deeper.
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