Your specialness in God's eyes

“God loves the rest of us so much that He gave us you.”

This thought came to me one day while I was praying for myself about a problem I was having. It wasn’t a big problem, but this thought was so reassuring and healing that I don’t even recall now what the problem was.

Then just a short while afterward, I had occasion to share that thought with a friend. This friend had been telling me some discouraging news that had him feeling pretty low, and as I was listening to him, I was praying that he be more aware of how special he is as God’s child.

And that’s when I knew it was time to share that God-inspired message with him.

Since that day, I’ve thought about it, noticing how its truth is shown to me. For example, when our son graduated from college, he directed an after-school program at a middle school. The children came from economically and socially diverse families; some were from single-parent homes, or even no-parent homes, where they lived with relatives or guardians assigned by the court. He taught the children social skills and good study habits, while also taking them to restaurants, museums, and workshops for teens.

One day he was speaking to his class about sports and how participating in them helps develop discipline, respect for others, and character. One young man had an interest in wrestling but was reluctant to seriously look into it, thinking that he lacked the ability to compete. He asked our son what he thought about it. Since my son had wrestled in high school, he encouraged the student to give wrestling a try.

Four years later, long after my son had left that job, he was having a tough time after a relationship ended unexpectedly. And just at his lowest point, a glimmer of encouragement peeked through the clouds. A friend called to tell him that the local newspaper had run an article that day about a high school wrestler who had just been given an award for excellence. It was the same young man whom he had mentored four years earlier. The student credited our son for inspiring his interest and success.

This moved me. Right when my son was feeling so unappreciated, he was made aware that he was actually greatly appreciated. At the very moment that he needed it most, he received a message just for him, to assure him that he is truly very special.

My study of Christian Science has illumined this experience. I’ve found that while studying the Bible and “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” by Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, that I’ve not always clearly understood them. But if I’m alert, something I’m dealing with will make a passage from those books more meaningful and relevant. For example, this quotation became clearer to me through my son’s experience: “Would existence without personal friends be to you a blank? Then the time will come when you will be solitary, left without sympathy; but this seeming vacuum is already filled with divine Love. When this hour of development comes, even if you cling to a sense of personal joys, spiritual Love will force you to accept what best promotes your growth” (p. 266).

Life presents continual opportunities to witness the effects of “spiritual Love.” There are times, however, when these opportunities may appear harsh, and we may not recognize them as an “hour of development” as Mrs. Eddy described them. Yet, right there in the midst of the trial, God’s loving grace is gently leading and assuring us of our innate specialness, just as it always is.

Looking at our life through a spiritual lens, when we face discouragement and depression, we have divine authority to know right then that God is present with blessings. Right where we are, is God, is Love – perfectly expressed as us. All of us, in every part, through every pore of our being, are brilliantly shining the unfailing light of Love.

No mist of discouragement, depression, or victimization is greater than God’s love to manifest Himself through us, through our every action, by our every thought.

Mrs. Eddy provided this encouragement: “Remember, thou canst be brought into no condition, be it ever so severe, where Love has not been before thee and where its tender lesson is not awaiting thee. Therefore despair not nor murmur, for that which seeketh to save, to heal, and to deliver, will guide thee, if thou seekest this guidance” (“The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany,” pp. 149-150).

Look at it this way. We may as well see ourselves as special. God does!

The God of love and peace shall be with you.
                                    II Corinthians 13:11

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