NLDC BACKSTAGE: AUGUST 2007

Dare to be Different!

Are you tired of playing games, wearing masks or trying to be someone other than yourself? Wouldn't you like the freedom to just be accepted for who you are, without the pressure to be someone you really don't know how to be? Would you like to learn how to embrace your uniqueness and resist the pull to be like everyone else? God knew what He was doing when He made you. You are a unique individual—God created you the way you are! It's time that we dare to accept ourselves as different and stop being insecure about who we are.

If you’re going to overcome insecurities and be the person God’s called you to be, you must have the courage to be different. Unhappiness and frustration happen when we reject our uniqueness and try to be like each other. If you’re going to be successful at being completely you, then you’re going to have to take a chance on not being like everyone else. You must ask yourself, Am I a people pleaser or a God pleaser?

Becoming a people pleaser is one of the easiest things we can do...but it can ultimately make us very unhappy. When we begin pleasing others, we begin to hear comments that make us feel good about ourselves. That’s okay as long as we don't derive our sense of worth from it. People are too fickle for us to place our sense of worth in their opinions. We’re worth something because God says we're worth something—not because of what people think or say about us.

People pleasers allow others to control their lives in order to gain acceptance and approval. But God doesn't want us to be easily manipulated or controlled by others. We shouldn't let other people's opinions of us control our actions.

At the same time, we must walk in love. We can't just do anything we want, whenever we want, with total disregard for the feelings of others. We can't say, "I'm going to do this, and if you don't like it, that's tough—that's your problem!"

The Bible commands us to love others, and love doesn't behave that way. However, we must not allow people to manipulate and control us to the point that we’re never free to be who we are. If we do, we’ll always try to become the person we think others expect us to be.

The world (those we know and deal with on a daily basis who may be family, friends, people in the neighborhood or even in the church) is continually trying to conform us to its image. The word conform means, "to be similar in form or character; to behave in accordance with prevailing modes or customs.”

Romans 12:2 says, Do not be conformed to this world (this age),…but be transformed (changed) by the [entire] renewal of your mind…It’s then that we find the good and acceptable will of God for our lives.

People will always try to fit us into their mold, partly due to their own insecurity. It makes them feel better about what they are doing if they can get someone else to do it too.

Very few people have the ability to be who they are and let everybody else be who they are. Can you imagine how nice the world would be if we would all do that? Each person would be secure in who he is and let others be who they are. We would not have to try to be imitations of each other.

God wants to take us, with all our weaknesses and inabilities, and transform us, by working from the inside out, to do something powerful in this earth. If we’re going to overcome insecurities and succeed at being ourselves, we can't continue to be afraid of what everybody else may think.

We can't continue to allow others to fit us into their mold. We are different! We are unique! God created us this way to accomplish His purposes here on earth.

Testimony from the Road

This weekend we were at a youth retreat in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, with a church from Great Mills. We had two scheduled services while we were there, one on the first night and another the second. The service on the first night went remarkably well. But the second night, something phenomenal happened.

My team and I were doing the second night service, enjoying it and at the same time receiving the message we were presenting. The last sketch we did was a mime done to Third Day’s King Of Glory. This sketch portrays a girl who gives Jesus a thought but then goes back to sin. Later on she decides to give Jesus her sin and allows him to take it away. Afterwards she gives her heart away to someone who breaks it and she falls to the ground in pain. Jesus takes her pain with him and then it leads him into the crucifixion. The sketch was good up until that part, and then it became a God thing.

The CD “randomly” stopped altogether. I was the person operating the player, and I couldn’t get it to do anything! Immediately the team went into vocal reactions, starting with the first lash of the whip, condemning the sinner, and eventually nailing the Savior to the cross.

The presence of God slipped in at that moment and took every heart captive. Many, including myself, shedding tears over the thought of what our Lord had done for us. At that moment it became more than a sketch, both to the campers and our team; it became real. It was no longer just a story we could portray but a reenactment of a real love, a true humility, and a display of how our own lives had been redeemed by Jesus Christ.

Lisa Stallings