“Are we honestly going to insist on drawing our security from people – men or women – who are oblivious to the inordinate amount of weight we give to their estimation of us?”
And that’s how we began our discussion of the first three chapters of Beth Moore’s So Long Insecurity. It was a very good place to start. Don’t you think?
One of the truths Beth points out is that “if I really want to go, something has to happen to make me want to leave where I am.” This same truth is a major theme in Henry Blackaby’s Experiencing God – “You can’t stay where you are and go with God.”
We want to be secure women! Women who don’t evaluate ourselves based on human opinion or comparisons. Women whose self-esteem is based on God’s esteem.
If that’s the case – If we want to be God-secure women, then some things in our thinking, acting, and reacting will have to change!
Chapter 2 held a great definition of insecurity:
Insecurity refers to a profound sense of self-doubt – a deep feeling of uncertainty about our basic worth and our place in the world. Insecurity is associated with chronic self-consciousness, along with a chronic lack of confidence in ourselves and anxiety about our relationships. The insecure man or woman lives in constant fear of rejection and a deep uncertainty about whether his or her own feelings and desires are legitimate.”
We took this definition and circled the words that ear-mark insecurity. Words like:
self-doubt
uncertainty
chronic self-consciousness
lack of confidence
anxiety
constant fear of rejection
deep uncertainty of the legitimacy of feelings and desires
Do any of these words describe your struggle?
“You and I are going to have to come to a place where we stop handing people the kind of power only God should wield over us… The answer is to deal with the insecurity, believing that everything God says about us is true.” (Chapter 2)
Beth says, “Most of us have what I call a prominent false positive: one thing that we think would make us more secure in all things. You want to know how you can pinpoint your own prominent false positive? The thing you tend to associate most with security? Think of a person you believe to be secure and determine what earthly thing he or she has that you don’t feel like you possess…the one thing that would make you more secure in all things….”
In other words, what is it that you see in other people that makes you think that if you possessed that thing, you wouldn’t have a reason to be insecure?
Things like thinness or shapely figure, financial security, great house, perfect kids, wonderful husband, fantastic job, designer wardrobe, exotic vacation, etc… When we all know deep down inside that is NOT the truth! We could have every one of these things and still be the most anxious, self-doubting, self-conscious, uncertain and fearful woman in the world. Those false positives are exactly that – FALSE.
What are your “false positives?” I was quite convicted of my own! I encourage you to spend a little time thinking and asking God to identify your false positives so that you and the Lord can break them apart one by one.
Chapter three closes with the main challenge for each one of us:
“to let the healthy, utterly whole, and completely secure part of us increasingly overtake our earthen vessels until it drives our every emotion, reaction, and relationship. When we allow God’s truth to eclipse every false positive and let our eyes spring open to the treasure we have, there in His glorious reflection we’ll also see the treasure we are. And the beauty of the Lord our God will be upon us (Psalm 90:17, NKJV).”
That’s what I want. How about you???
**Next week’s assignment: Read chapters 4-6.
Much love to each of you~
Jennifer
I so need to join in on this book study. I love Beth Moore. This looks like a great book!