Episode #007 What God Thinks of You!

What I'm going to share with you today is exactly what you need to start winning your battle over shame. That feeling that you're just not enough. I want to challenge you to think about yourself in a new way. I'm going to tell you what God thinks of you. You may have heard me say this before. I often tell people who are not followers of Christ that... If you knew what God thinks of you, you would have no problem believing in Him, because everyone wants to be thought of the way God thinks of us.

Transcript

[Craig Walker]: 0:01

Welcome back to the Trudy of Masterpiece podcast. My name is Craig Walker and I'm your host. I'm thrilled to be with you today. What I'm going to share with you today is exactly what you need to start winning your battle over shame. That feeling that you're just not enough. I want to challenge you to think about yourself in a new way. I'm going to tell you what God thinks of you. You may have heard me say this before. I often tell people who are not followers of Christ that... If you knew what God thinks of you, you wouldn't have no problem believing in Him, because everyone wants to be thought of the way God thinks of us. Well, if you're new to my program, thanks for joining me. Let me just give you a heads up. We have new programs that drop every second Tuesday of the month. Sometimes we'll drop a bonus talk. Today, I hope you like what you're hearing. If you do, please subscribe. And if you would, Take my link and share it on your social media platforms. When you do, you're helping me extend my reach and to reach more and more people. All right, let's jump into our talk today. In one of my all time favorite movies, it's this Ford V Ferrari. When I say all time favorites, I'm not kidding. This is one of those movies when it came out streaming. I watched it on a Friday night, got up on a Saturday morning and watched it again. I've seen it about a half a dozen times since. It's a movie about Carroll Shelby, an American automotive designer who's most known for his design of the Ford Mustang Cobra, for the Ford Motor Company. The movie opens with Shelby on stage at the unveiling of the Ford Mustang, and he tells a story to an audience at Ford why he's there to help them build a race car. Carroll said, when I was 10 years old, my pop said to me, by the way, you have to. kind of hear it and him reading this in his Southern accent, especially if you've seen the movie. He said, my dad said, son, it's truly a lucky man that knows what he wants to do in this world because that man will never have to work a day in his life. He said, but there are a few, a precious few, and heck, I don't know if I'm lucky or not. Well, actually, he said, I don't know if they're lucky or not, but there are a few people who find something they have to do. Something obsesses them. Something, if they can't do it, it's going to drive them clean out of their mind. Then Carol says, I'm that guy. Near the end of the movie, after accomplishing his goals, experiencing the lows of heartbreak and the highs of success, Carroll says in a solemn and a slow tone, can I ask you a question? The only question that matters, who are you? I believe Shelby nailed it. The only question that matters is who are you? Here's a truth. Your destiny is determined by your identity. I know we tend to think that talent, intelligence, looks, charisma, we tend to say that's king. We say to ourselves, if only I were as gifted as, if only I were as smart as, we think talent's king. It's not. Identity is king. Identity trumps talent, skills, intelligence, looks, charisma every time. Like a thermostat regulates temperature, identity regulates your potential. If you want to reach a God given potential, then you've got to have a God given identity. So the only question, honestly, the only question that matters is who are you? Identity. It's a powerful force. Your identity is either robbing you of your God designed potential or it's empowering it. Did you know? that you can tether a mature male elephant to a pipe staked into the ground with just a little cord. Did you know that? It's a fascinating story. It's a true story. The way you train a massive mammal to stand tied is to do it when he's a baby. You take one end of a cord and tied around the baby elephant's ankle. And you tie the other end around maybe a one inch stake driven into the ground. The baby elephant ill-fights to free itself, but it soon learns that it's useless to resist and it gives up. And even after that elephant reaches a mature weight of sometimes more than 14,000 pounds, could easily uproot the stake, and by the way, could easily uproot a tree with its trunk pulling it out of the ground. It never tries. Why? Well, as a baby elephant, it's developed an identity. An identity that psychologists call learned helplessness. Incredible. There's a children's book called The Little Engine That Could written around 1920, it's been rewritten a few times. This is a fascinating story of identity. There was a little red train engine that pulled a load of, well, a train load of food and toys over a mountain to little children, little boys and girls that lived on the other side of the mountain in a valley down below. One day the little red engine broke down. A shiny new passenger train car engine passed by and all the toys on the train and the clown began to yell, help us, help us, because we need to get the toys and the food to the kids on the other side. But the powerful engine said, no, I can't help you and refused. Later, a little freight engine or rather a massive freight engine was asked to help and it too refused. Then a tired old rusty steam engine was asked to help that had just returned from the other side of the mountain. And the old rusty engine said, I must rest. I cannot, I cannot, I cannot, as you can hear it chugging away. Well finally, a little blue train engine that had never crossed the mountain in its life. It had only been used to move train cars around the station and in the switch station. It came by and when the little blue engine realized that it was the only hope to get the help, the food and the toys to the little boys and girls on the other side of the mountain, When it realized it was the only help, it said, well, I think I can. She hits herself to the little train that was loaded with toys and food for the kids down below. And she tugged and she pulled and she tugged and she pulled and slowly, slowly she started to roll. Puff puff chug went the little blue engine. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can, I think I can. And up and up and faster and faster, the little engine comped until at last, she had reached the top of the mountain. Crossing over the mountain and seeing all the little children down below, cheering as they saw the food and the toys come in their way. The little engine seemed to smile and say, as she puffs steadily down the mountain, I thought I could, I thought I could, I thought I could, I thought I could. So the only question I want to ask is, who are you? Hey, are you tired of living with your identity and your potential tethered to learned helplessness? Or are you ready to begin living the life that you were born to love? You can. If you're ready, it's time to discover and to declare your God-given identity. There's one verse in the Bible that captures the essence of your identity. This is the verse that Paul wrote to the people in Ephesus in chapter two, verse 10. By the way, let me pause and tell you this is the core of my curriculum, my coaching. This one verse is central to a book that I'm writing called Shameless, Living the Life That You Were Born To Love. So what you're getting today is just a taste. One chapter out of the book. I hope you like it. Now, I need to tell you this. Before you can fully appreciate who you are, you must understand whose you are. Okay? Your God's work of art, your God's. That's enough. The God who made you is all you need. He is the Omni God. That's a Latin prefix that means all. God is omnipotent, all powerful. Omniscient, all knowing. Omnipresent, present everywhere, all at once. And he's all loving. His love for you is absolute. You don't earn it. You don't deserve it, but you do have it. Knowing whose you are can make all the difference. This is a story that I read from a newspaper, the Indianapolis Star years ago. Melanie Stevens, a 29 year old nurse, she thought she'd found this incredible treasure while traveling. to visit a patient. But what she actually found was an old cello lying in the trash. She took the instrument to her boyfriend, a cabinet maker, and asked him if he would either repair the instrument or convert it to some kind of unique cabinet to hold CDs. At least this what nurse Stephen had actually found. She actually found this and given to her boyfriend and asked him to convert it to a unique cabinet to hold CDs was a 340 year old instrument worth $3.5 million. It was one of 60 cellos made by Stradivari in his 1684 Cremona Italy workshop. The cello was nicknamed the General Kid for the man who brought it to England from Italy near the end of the 18th century. It had been purchased just three decades earlier by the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. The Philharmonic principal cellist, Peter Stumpf, had accidentally left the instrument outside his home. Surveillance cameras showed a thief on a bicycle taking it. Now, please understand this. I know nothing about cellos. Looking at an Antonio Stradivari made cello, I couldn't have told it from a cello echo in Mexico. Okay. But regardless, when I heard this story, my heart sank. Why? Because I knew whose it was. It's a Stradivari. It's a rare treasure worth $3.5 million. And it's turned now into a unique cabinet to hold CDs. I think, what a waste. My heart broke. Without a doubt, every day human potential is wasted. Not because people lack it, because like Nurse Stevens, they just didn't know what they had. You are God's masterpiece. Enough. There's nothing that you will ever need that he can't supply. He's all powerful, all knowing, all loving, ever present. You can trust him. And he made you his masterpiece. A masterpiece is a pretty incredible word in itself. It's a word that the new living translators chose to translate the word poema. This is from which we get our word poem. In other words, God, like a poet, methodically, meticulously, painstakingly, fashioned your life word by word, line by line, crafting the perfect story. with a rhythm and flow that created a unique beauty. It was his masterpiece. In other words, you're not an accident. You're not a mistake. Regardless of the circumstances, hey, guess what else? Regardless of the stories that you've been told surrounding your birth, hey, you are God's design. You're His work of art. You don't become a masterpiece. God's not sitting in heaven wringing His hands wondering, when are you going to wake up and behave like a masterpiece? No, you are. That's who God made you to be. You are His masterpiece. A masterpiece is a work of art by which an artist makes himself known. A masterpiece is an artist defining work. In other words, you are to God what the Mona Lisa is to Leonardo da Vinci. You are to God what the statue of David is to Michelangelo. Listen to this passage. He said, For he raised us from the dead along with Christ, seated with him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ. Why do you do this? Listen, so God can point to us, point, like he points to you, in all future ages as examples of the incredible wealth of his grace and kindness toward us, as shown in all he has done for us who are united with Christ Jesus. It's like this, like an artist, just picture an artist on a stage. There's God. uncovering his creation. He steps back with one foot and one hand and points towards the work of art and with excitement goes, ta-da! You are God's ta-da! He points to you in all future ages as an example of the incredible wealth of His grace and kindness toward us who are united with Christ Jesus. In my mind I see in that era before time began. and God holding you up like Obi-Wan Kenobi holding up a hologram. He turns you this way, He turns you that way, He inspected every last detail of your existence. And finally, with a smile of satisfaction, God placed you on the shelf until the exact predetermined day, hour, and moment arrived for your grand entrance into this world. And God goes, ta-da! There you are. The moment of your birth, ta-da! That's who you are, His masterpiece. No wonder... He loved you and chose you before a single day had passed. Before a single deed had been done, God already loved you and chose you. Let me tell you why. The Psalmist tells us Psalm 139. He said, you saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. Every day of your life was laid out like... Tomorrow's clothing for work? Yeah. He said, how precious are your thoughts about me? Oh God, they cannot be numbered. All right, let's pause for a second because I think this begs a question. I hope you're thinking about it. What about all of those wrong choices that you've made? Um, what about all those wrong things that you did? Am I saying that God caused all of those things? He laid them out like tomorrow's clothing? Not at all. I'm saying he saw it. To say he saw it, that's one thing, but to say he caused it, that's quite another. God didn't cause the bad that you did. That was on you. God didn't cause the bad that happened to you. That was on someone else. But let me tell you what God did. Now in His sovereign love, He sees those things and He overrules them so that they don't ruin His work of art. They become part of His work of art. So that when people look at you with all your junk, all your flaws, all your warts and all your bad stuff, they point to Him and say, wow. What a work of art. Look at his incredible grace and kindness in all he has done for us who reunited with Christ Jesus. Paul said that he created us anew. We are his masterpiece. Created anew in Christ Jesus. What does that mean? When a person trusts Christ, they're born again. Created anew. They're born of the Spirit. Jesus said, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. It's a new birth. Often I hear people say that God made us brand new in Christ. I can actually hear the old preacher saying, and when you were born again you were made brand new. Everything about you was new and transformed into new and glorious person. That's great preaching and I think that intent is commendable, but the theology is terribly flawed. God did not create you into something you never were. No, God created you into be a new so that you could be all you always were, his masterpiece. When you were born again, you experienced a spiritual rebirth. Apart from Christ, apart from this new birth, you were incapable of sensing God with your flesh. Your flesh could only sense the physical. But now that you've had a spiritual rebirth, you sense God. Before your spiritual birth, you still had the same body. You didn't get a new body. I know some of us wish we did, but we didn't. You're still the same you. When you got saved, it affected your body not at all. You still have the same soul. Did you know that? Your soul is your mind, your will and your emotions. You're a thinking, choosing, feeling individual. You possess the same passions and desires and the dreams which are part of your soul. What happened the moment you believe? This is cool. God birthed within you a living spirit and your spirit now fellowships with God's indwelling spirit. You have the fellowship of the spirit, as Paul said. Now having been born again, born spiritually, you perceive differently. You don't just perceive with your physical senses, your flesh. You perceive with your spirit. When you're born again, you see yourself in a new light. This is so good. You sense yourself in the light of God's love. That's why when a person trusts Christ, they're often overwhelmed with emotion. For the first time, they just feel accepted. For the first time in their life, they feel worthy of love and belonging. They believe in themselves because they believe in an all-powerful, all-knowing, ever-present, all-loving God who made them His masterpiece. They believe because of their position in Christ. They know that no matter what they've done or what's been done to them, God is always on their side. He will work all things together for us for good, who love Him and who live for His purposes. When a person is born again, they awaken to hope. They see what previously could not be seen, the spiritual. the Kingdom of God, that place where God rules as King inside of them. They sense that he is for them. They understand that if God did not spare his own son, logically, they realize then there's nothing that he would not also through him freely give us to help us live the life that he created us to love. created us anew in Christ. When you think of your identity, probably the word Christian comes to mind, right? Here's something that's interesting. The word Christian, it does mean to be like Christ. It's a great title, don't get me wrong. But it has more contemporary religious roots than it does biblical roots. It's true. The term Christians, it's only used three times in the Bible. Okay, it is used in the Bible, but it's only used three times. The common way writers in the New Testament describe a follower of Christ is they say that he is one who is IN Christ. Anglican priest and theologian John R.W. Stott writes this. He said the expression in Christ, in the Lord, and in him occur 164 times in the letters of Paul alone. To be in Christ means to be organically united to Christ as a limb is in the body or as a branch is in the tree. In other words, all that is ascribed to Christ or accredited to Him is now accredited to you. That's why His holiness is your holiness. That's why His righteousness becomes your righteousness. That's why his authority becomes your authority. His power becomes your power. His death over sin is your death over sin. His resurrection to the new life is your resurrection to the new life. You don't behave like Christ because you're a Christian. You behave like Christ because you are in Christ. As Mr. Stott said, we are organically united to Christ as a limb is in the body or a branch is in the tree. That's who God created you to be. And if you will accept it, that's who you are. made anew in Christ. It means you have been restored to all the amazing potential God had in mind when He imagined you before the world began. This is incredible. This is so overwhelming. I was on a coaching call with my friend Amy. We were talking about what it means to be in Christ. Amy said, she interjected, said, Craig, I've always been taught that when I trusted Christ, God no longer sees me. God only sees Christ in me. Amy, I could tell she was her tone was slowing. She hesitated before she confided. She Craig, I've always thought that if God saw me. Now becoming very emotional, there was a lengthy pause before she could finish her thought. And finally, she said in a soft voice with hurt seeping from her wounds. I always thought that if God saw me, he would be. disgusted. My dear friend, please hear this. You need to know this. If that's what you think, if that's what you've been taught, you've been taught wrong. Because of Christ, God sees you. He looks you straight in the eye and through His word, He says to you, I love you. I am your Father. I'm proud to be your Father. I am your Father and you are my child. I believe in you and I am for you. You are my masterpiece. I want people to... I point to you. I want them to see you. No matter what you've done or will ever do, I will always be there and together with you we'll work this out even for good. think it's pretty incredible. He said, you are God's masterpiece. He created you anew in Christ Jesus. Now why? This is great. To do good things. The good things that He planned for you long ago before the world ever began. He saw it all. When God created you His masterpiece, He deposited within your soul purposes, passions, dreams, and desires. He created you anew that So now you're born again, you're born spiritually, and His Spirit came alive in you to commune with your spirit. His Spirit awakens you to God's love, God's power, God's purposes, and you awaken to your new potential. In other words, this is what happens. You become untethered from your past of learned helplessness. This is exactly what Paul had in mind when he wrote to the church in Thessalonica. Listen to this verse. He said, So we keep on praying for you. asking God to enable you to live a life worthy of His calling. This is great. What does it mean to live a life worthy of God's calling? Well, Paul tells us. It's not hard. Is it may He give you the power to accomplish all the good things your faith prompts you to do. This is amazing. Please don't tune out. God's Spirit is communicating with your spirit, all right? You awaken to these new... I started saying new, but they're not new. They've been there all along. Desires and dreams and passions and purposes. He deposited in your soul when he made you. And now with his spirit speaking to you, something in your soul, it's your faith that shouts out, OK, let's do this. You begin to believe that you can, that which was there all along. Now, I think I can. I can. Like Peter, when he saw Jesus walking on water, he cried out, this was his faith. Lord, if that is you, command that I get out of this boat and I come to you walking on water. You come alive, you're awakened to the reality of this new dimension, the spiritual, you're awakened to God. You received a new spirit to commune with God's spirit that's in you, you're awakened to your new potential to do the good things that God had in mind when he made you. Christ, you have the potential to be great and to do great things. I once heard Pastor Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, say this. He said, you're a ten somewhere. By the way, I think that's true. I don't think you're a ten at everything, but I think that you are a ten at something. No one in all the world was created to do the good things that God created you to do. As a masterpiece, you are an original. Did you know there's no such thing as a copy masterpiece? Yeah, they put people in prison for copying masterpieces and selling them for the original. I laugh when I think of what rapper, songwriter, singer, recording producer Pharrell Williams once said. He said, if you try to be anyone other than yourself, the best you can ever be is second best. He's dead on. Now, perhaps you wrestle with the notion that you're a 10 somewhere, okay? if you're thinking in the flesh. There was a time when I did too. I just couldn't imagine myself being anything other than ordinary. But now that I think about it, that's laughable too because have you ever seen an ordinary masterpiece? When God imagined you, he saw and he oversaw every detail of your life. The psalmist explained it like this. He said, you made all the delicate inner parts of my body. You knit me together in my mother's womb. Thank you, thank you, thank you, like Gomer Powell. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay, that's just me. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex. Your workmanship is marvelous. How well I know it. I gotta pause here. Do you know it? Do you know that his workmanship in you is marvelous? He said, you watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. Underline those words. Your workmanship is marvelous. How well I know it. I don't know the good things that God created you to do. I don't. You won't find that out by reading my book. You won't find that out by getting my coaching. I want to tell you how you can find it out though. By listening to the Spirit in you. When you dare to believe that you're God's masterpiece, that He's created you anew in Christ. To do the good things that He planned for you long ago, you begin to sense God's Spirit speaking, leading, revealing. Listen now, can you hear him? Can you hear what he's saying to you? It's been there all along. I was on a coaching call just the other day with Zach. Zach's in his fifth week of the Trudy of Masterpiece coaching training. Zach's starting to wake up to the wonder of who God created him to be. Zach said, there's this sense that I was made for more. I was made for more than just keeping a checklist of doing good and resisting bad. so much the time that's what Christians think. Zach went on to say that he had lamented wasting so much of his life, stifling his uniqueness. Zach said, I grew up seeing my relationship with God as being good and doing good Christian things. I never let myself believe that God had made me for more, had created me uniquely to do specific good things. But then he said, even now. As I look back, I knew it even then. God was whispering, but there's more. There's more. And I wanted to believe it. I just didn't. Well, you've heard the truth. What will you do with the truth? There's a saying that nothing changes if nothing changes. If you want to be untethered from your learned helplessness, that identity, and begin living the life that you were born to love, then something's got to change. On February 14th, 2014, I sat in a life coach's office. And he said, Craig, this, by the way, I just unloaded my baggage of what I thought of myself. And he said, Craig, you got a lot of baggage. And I thought, yeah, tell me what I don't know. And he did. He said, you can go out of here today, a different man than the man that came in. Wanting to believe I just said, how? This person said, all you have to do is believe. You know, it sounded so simple. It actually sounded too simple to be true. I wanted to be different. I wanted to be untethered from my doubts. I left and I didn't leave a different man, but I did go home wrestling with the scriptures. And I concluded it's true. All I have to do. is take God for His word and believe. You know, after hours of struggling with what I've described now as one of my most intense spiritual battles I've ever experienced, I finally gave in. Somewhere in the night as I lay in my bed, I made a declaration of faith. Right now, this is what I'm asking you to do to get your win. I'm inviting you to join me. It seems simple. I know it seems so simple to be true. But it's true. The first thing that has to change is your mind. What do you believe? What do you believe about you? The only question that matters is who are you? Would you right now make a declaration of your true identity? Would you declare with me, I am God's masterpiece? I am the work of the all-knowing, all-loving, all-knowing, All-powerful, ever-present God. There's nothing wrong with me. There's nothing missing, nothing broken, nothing so deeply ingrained in me that I can't change. It needs changing to do all He created me to do. I'm a ten at something. Father, You created me. You created me anew in Christ, restoring me to the amazing potential You had in mind when You imagined me. This is my declaration. This is who I am. I want to ask you if you would right now is just to stop and to write it out, write out your declaration. Keep it simple. Type it out, print it, post it where you will see it. And when you do, you've just taken a giant step towards living the life that God created you to love. I just hope and pray so much. that you more than enjoyed. You've been helped by what you've heard today and you will take it to heart. Again, I hope you've enjoyed this program. If you have, make sure you subscribe. Consider sharing it on your social media platforms with your friends. Help me to help more and more people find and follow Jesus Christ just by discovering who God says they are. More good stuff is to come. The second Tuesday of every month will drop. Thanks again for joining me. If I can help you in any way, you can always reach me at craig at crai Have a great day.