God Treasures Your Place

“And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place” (Acts 17:26, ESV).

A treasured friend shared with me recently, “I am searching for a sense of significance in my life.” She was verbalizing something so many of us struggle with: a need to feel like what we are doing on the planet actually matters in the grand scheme of things.

This friend of mine is a stay-at-home mom of several children. She deals with incoming thought darts from the enemy whispering that her daily activities are of little consequence. How many of us believers get similar lies coming into our minds from the adversary? He points out to us well-known individuals achieving obvious, amazing exploits for God, and tells us that what we are doing just doesn’t measure up. It barely makes any difference, he suggests. Sadly, we listen to his lies way too often.

What does the Father have to say about this? Here are a couple of His far superior thoughts, which trump the enemy’s lies every time:

“‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘…plans to give you hope and a future’” (Jer. 29:11, NIV).

God Himself is the one who thought you up. Before He even got started on bringing forth creation, He already had carefully laid the plans for your individual life. We learn from Acts 17:26 (above) that He chose exactly the time and place for you to be born. He picked out the family. He selected the doors of opportunity that would open for you to walk through. You can trust that He has hemmed you in, behind and before, and brought you to the place where you are right now. Assuming you haven’t pulled a Jonah (and you would keenly know it if you had), you are exactly where He intended.

He also tells us: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10, ESV).

Both you, and the good works that He foreordained for you to do, are His workmanship. His idea. His execution. He crafted you masterfully with the specific set of abilities and passions that are inside you, and set you in the timeline of history exactly where and when He wanted you.

I’ll share something with you from my own experience as a creator that is relevant to this conversation. I absolutely love to fill in adult coloring books as I soak my spirit in worship music, often for hours at a time. I’ll come back to the same page again and again on different days. Frequently it will take weeks or even a month to finish any given page because the designs are so detailed. When I have put the last touches on one, I look at my work with profound satisfaction and enjoyment. Months and years go by, and I still revisit my past completed pages with ongoing delight. I honestly just feel deeply contented, gazing at them. I wish I could adequately convey what a positive feeling it is, but maybe you can relate. Maybe you have an outlet where you get to express your artistic sensibilities too. If so, I know you get me.

I am a very “mini” creator. My artistic expression is so very diminutive. However, what I am describing to you about my enjoyment of what I have brought forth, points to something in my own design. I was made in the image of God, the Creator of the entire universe. This little instinct in me is a reflection of an enormous one inside of Him. He is ecstatically thrilled with what He has made! And that includes His masterful craftsmanship of the details of your life.

You are His workmanship. There are no adequate words to express how much delight He takes in the way He made you. He treasures His design of your life infinitely, according to the infinite capacity of His heart. Those plans He came up with for your decades alive – before He even planted you in your mother’s womb – they cause His insides to light up with joy. Watching them unfold as you walk forward through your life means everything to Him.

This is true for every one of us alive. Our Father delights in each of us to the same infinite degree, including the good works He prepared for us to do. Do you know that praying with our young children at bedtime, being extra kind to the waitress at our lunch appointments, sharing a word of wisdom with our friends, and serving our family with household chores…all count on that list? These simple everyday acts are the good works we were made for. And our Abba delights in watching us do them. He delights in our destiny; in our little part in His enormous, overarching plan, way more than we could imagine.

Some humans receive five talents from God. Some receive two. Some receive one. Does that make the five-talent person better or more important or more significant than the others? Absolutely not. After all, what do we have that we have not been given? Who has ever given to God? What delights His heart is not the number of talents we have. It’s the way we use them each day poured out in loving worship to Him.

Your days on earth are infinitely important to your Abba. Let’s ask Him today, and every day, “Father, give me Your value system. Let me see my life the way You do. Please show my heart my significance in Your eyes.”

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What is it that makes our days on earth matter?