How are you VALidated???
There is nothing more wonderful this side of heaven than experiencing the revelation of God's nature little by little each passing day. He will use anything and everything to teach us more about Himself, and knowing Him is pure JOY. So, I had the idea to chronicle these wonderful revelations as God puts them into my heart. I thought, "I'll start a blog!", totally forgetting that I already had one from several years ago. Well, it has a new name, courtesy of my dad who is ever so good with words: VALidations. My nickname is Val, and my initials are V. A. L. See what he did there? Pretty clever.
Validation.....that is what we constantly crave, isn't it? Especially those of us who feel unseen and underappreciated. I am a stay-at-home mom. My daily life is one of very little glamour and even less praise. Who will validate me by saying, "Hooray! That's officially the one-thousandth time you have washed, folded, and put away that particular pair of pajamas!!! Great job!!!" No one. I don't go to the workplace each day, and get validated with a compliment from my boss or even a raise. And still I have found ways to get validation from others. Facebook, the outlet for isolated people everywhere to present the best of themselves and leave out the worst and get all the validation you could ever desire. It becomes addicting and you crave those little likes and hearts like a drug. If that isn't enough I can use my children as little validation pawns. Are they successful in school? Parenting skills validated! And I can find ways to make my efforts at home validate me. Is my interior design Pinterest-worthy? Homemaking skills validated! But guess what? You can have all the validation from the world that you want and still be asking yourself, "Am I good enough?"
There's a reason for that. We are designed to crave this validation in the form of a relationship...someone that sees you fully, not just what you're willing to "put out there" for the world to see. Someone that sees those things that you wish no one would ever know about...your worst mistakes and most incredible failures...and loves you anyway. Someone who even knows your deepest thoughts which you would never utter out loud and loves you STILL. Only one person knows you this deeply and rather than running away from you, he runs AFTER you. This is Jesus Christ. "For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person-though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die-but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." God, who knows me fully, thought it was good to give up His perfect Son for me. That's all the validation I will ever need.
Validation.....that is what we constantly crave, isn't it? Especially those of us who feel unseen and underappreciated. I am a stay-at-home mom. My daily life is one of very little glamour and even less praise. Who will validate me by saying, "Hooray! That's officially the one-thousandth time you have washed, folded, and put away that particular pair of pajamas!!! Great job!!!" No one. I don't go to the workplace each day, and get validated with a compliment from my boss or even a raise. And still I have found ways to get validation from others. Facebook, the outlet for isolated people everywhere to present the best of themselves and leave out the worst and get all the validation you could ever desire. It becomes addicting and you crave those little likes and hearts like a drug. If that isn't enough I can use my children as little validation pawns. Are they successful in school? Parenting skills validated! And I can find ways to make my efforts at home validate me. Is my interior design Pinterest-worthy? Homemaking skills validated! But guess what? You can have all the validation from the world that you want and still be asking yourself, "Am I good enough?"
There's a reason for that. We are designed to crave this validation in the form of a relationship...someone that sees you fully, not just what you're willing to "put out there" for the world to see. Someone that sees those things that you wish no one would ever know about...your worst mistakes and most incredible failures...and loves you anyway. Someone who even knows your deepest thoughts which you would never utter out loud and loves you STILL. Only one person knows you this deeply and rather than running away from you, he runs AFTER you. This is Jesus Christ. "For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person-though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die-but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." God, who knows me fully, thought it was good to give up His perfect Son for me. That's all the validation I will ever need.
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