A Rescue and an Identity

God did two really amazing things for me this week. As part of my class at Exchanged Lives, I spend some one-on-one time with a supervisor. I had talked to my supervisor, Bret, about how I tend to feel unimportant, unloved (in spite of the fact that people DO love me) and worthless. I was getting ready to go back and meet with Bret so we could pray through that stuff. I was getting apprehensive because even though Bret is an exceptionally kindhearted man, I was not wanting him to learn more about how much of a confused and clueless loser I am. At that point my thoughts of being a loser got so intense, like: nobody wants me and I don't belong on this planet; I'm unworthy to breathe the air, and I'm alone. In my mind was a picture of me being pushed further and further into a dark hole, and I was scared. At this point I wondered, where is God? And immediately the Lord put a song into my mind:
You are my hiding place,
You always fill my heart with songs of deliverance
Whenever I am afraid, I will trust in You
I will trust in You
Let the weak say I am strong in the strength of my Lord.
This song comes from Psalm 32 and Psalm 56. It calmed me right down, and it was so wonderful to see God come to the rescue of the damsel in distress. The other thing that impressed me was that I didn't have to compose a religious prayer to get His attention. I didn't even have a chance to pray for help, yet there He was in an instant to pull me out of my darkness.
Two days later I prayed with Bret and forgave myself for all the judgments I had made against myself--all the many ways that I believed I was a failure, worthless, etc. Bret explained to me that it says in Matthew 7:1 that we shouldn't judge, and that includes judging ourselves. After forgiving myself, I realized that God had long ago forgiven me for all that. And continuing the train of thought, I saw that when God looks at me, He never ever sees sin; it's forgiven. He only sees His goodness that He put in me. And I need to see myself the way God sees me; otherwise I'm not seeing the truth. I came away thinking, maybe I'm OK after all. This has given me a lot of happiness, and confidence.
(Dear sister Susan, rejoice, rejoice; your sister may have finally stopped being hard on herself).