Episode 1. Handcrafted in the Heart of God
Who am I? Where’s my life headed? What if my life ends up just slipping away and I miss out on my destiny? How can I be the me I was intended to be? Join Berni Dymet, on Christianityworks as he …
When we talk about being the ‘me’ I was meant to be, first we have to understand who I was meant to be and who you and I are meant to be is what God made us to be.
Who am I?
I’m always excited when we start a new series and that’s exactly what we are doing on the programme today. This is the first programme in a four part series that I’ve called “Being the Me I was Meant to Be”.
Often we live life day to day without thinking too much about it. We just go along and do the things we always do. We get up, we go to work, we go to school – whatever it is that we do, we do it over and over and over again.
But for a lot of people, bubbling away deep inside somewhere, is this sense of ‘what’s this all about? Why am I doing this? What’s the point?’ And the reality is this; we get to live just one life on this earth. It’s not a dress rehearsal – it never is. We can’t hit the rewind button and replay bits. When today is gone, it’s gone – that’s it. Every year, every week, every day, every moment that you and I have lived up to this point, is gone – we can never get it back.
The only thing left in our time here on earth is the time between right now and when we breathe our last breath. It’s a sobering thought! Most people have a sense of destiny – whether or not they believe in Jesus, they believe in things that are meant to be. How often have you heard someone say, ‘well I think that was just meant to be‘- or ‘if it’s meant to be, it’ll happen?’ Whether it’s karma or whether it that sort of ‘c’est sera, sera – what ever will be will be, ‘thing’, we have a sense of a destiny to fulfil and, I believe, that’s because you and I, we all are made in the image of God.
Not everybody knows Him – not everybody has a relationship with Jesus Christ, but because each one of us is made in the image of God, there’s something inside us that says, “Hang on, I think there’s a plan for my life.” And when we look at the time that we have left, a profound question of life emerges. Am I being the ‘me’ that I was meant to be? It’s a huge question! And it’s not about having things – it’s about being; it’s about living out that destiny.
The turning point of my life came when I was thirty six years old. I was reading a book and the author asked a question. ‘Do you want to be or do you want to have?’ I’ll say that again – ’Do you want to be or do you want to have?’ And I realised, very clearly, that I was living to ’have’. And having things, having money and buying new things and all that stuff, is not ‘being‘; it’s not ‘living’ as much as the world, the television will blare at us, that having this ‘thing’ will make us happy – we know it doesn’t work that way.
‘Having’ is about the next car or the next sound system or the next pair of shoes. ‘Being’ is a profound sense of joy and contentment; being really happy with who we are, enjoying the relationships that we have. Let me ask you something. As you contemplate the time that you have left on the planet, when you ask yourself the question, ‘Am I being the ‘me’ I was meant to be’ – what’s the answer? Yes or no? If it’s ‘yes’, we are talking a profound sense of joy and peace and contentment that I was talking about just before. If the answer’s ‘no’ then we are talking a nagging sense that ‘I’m missing out on something – is this all there is – surely there must be something more?’
My experience is that most people, by far the majority, are in the ‘no’ category and that’s why we are doing this series – ‘Being the Me I was Meant to Be’ – to help us get the whole foundation of life sorted. Come on, we’ve got one chance – let’s get it right; let’s live it out; let’s get our lives on track; live it out to the full. Let’s live a life that, when we are on death’s door, we can look back with a deep and profound sense of satisfaction and say to myself, ‘you know, I lived it to the full.’ I became the ‘me’ that I was meant to be. Now I’m ready for eternity with my God.’
Father, I pray as we spend some time in your Word together today and over the next few weeks, you’ll just open our hearts to the wonder of creation – to the wonder of how you made us – each one so different and yet each one in your image. And show us Lord, the ‘me’ that we are meant to be. We ask that in Jesus name. Amen.
You know, for me the starting point of being the ‘me’ I was meant to be, is knowing where I have come from and who I am. So many people in the midst of life are not really comfortable with who they are. And when that’s the case, you don’t have a real sense of security. You are like a cork bobbing around in a stormy ocean.
I’m going to explore that today and have a look at Psalm 139. So if you have a Bible, grab it, open it up. This is Psalm that I come back to again and again and again in my own life because it reminds me of who I am. And what I love about this Psalm is the writer starts in the middle of the dilemmas of his life and works his way back to God to discover who he is. Have a listen. We’ll just look at the first part.
“Lord you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit down. You know when I rise up. You perceive my thoughts far away. You discern my going out and my lying down. You’re familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue, you know it completely Lord. You hem me in, behind and before. You have laid your hand upon me. O Lord, such knowledge is too wonderful for me – it’s just too lofty to attain.
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there. If I make my bed in the depths you’re there too. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me; your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light will become a night around me”, Lord even the darkness will not be dark to you – the night will shine like day for the darkness is as light to you.”
A Different Perspective
I love that Psalm that we just read before because it’s about life; it’s about someone, probably King David, looking at their life from God’s perspective. Let me just read it again; it’s beautiful.
“Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise. You know my thoughts from far away. You discern my going out and my lying down. You’re familiar with all of my ways. Before a word is even on my tongue, you know it completely, Lord. You hem me in, behind and before. You’ve laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me – too lofty to attain.
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? Because if I go the heavens, you’re there. If I make my bed in the depths, you are there too. If I rise on the wings on the dawn, if I settle on the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me; your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light will become night around me“, even the darkness will not be dark to you – the night will shine like day for the darkness is as light to you.”
See, God knows what we are thinking. He knows when we come in and go out. He knows when we are lying down and we’re standing up. He knows before a word is even on my tongue, exactly what I’m going to say and what you are going to say. Exactly what we are thinking. Exactly what the needs and the cries of our heart are. Wherever you go, wherever I go, He hems us in. In the heavens, in the depths, on the farthest side of the sea and when life is pitch black and dark, even there His light will shine.
See, King David’s writing about life. I mean, we all travel through darkness and sometimes life can feel so empty and hollow and it’s like it’s going nowhere. Ever woken up on a Monday morning and contemplated the week ahead and just wished that it would go away? And think, “I just cannot face another week!” And David starts off this Psalm with a profound understanding that it doesn’t matter where I go, what I do, how dark I feel, “God if I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me and your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me and the light will become night around me, even the darkness will not be dark to you. The night will shine like the day for the darkness is as light to you.’”
Something that I really used to struggle with, especially after I became a Christian, is that somehow my faith – the sacred things in my life – seems to be such a long way apart from life itself. I mean, I was in the Information Technology industry. I ran a large consulting firm and I’d go and deal with organizations and their issues and their technologies and their projects and their project plans and system architectures; all that ‘stuff’ that was my work life.
And I thought, ‘what’s this got to do with my faith; what’s this got to do with God? There’s this huge disconnect between what I saw as ‘God’ stuff and ‘work’ stuff; the sacred stuff and the profane stuff. This Psalm helped me to see that God was in every part of my life. Not just the holy, sacred bits; not just at church, during worship, not only in the sacred zone, but in every bit of my life.
With the mum who’s got a lounge room full of wet nappies drying and a crying baby and feeding it in the middle of the night. With the elderly widow who’s in a residential aged care facility and the body is not what it used to be and you don’t have the mobility and the flexibility any more. At work and at school and in life – get it? God is there every minute of every day – God is in that place with you and me. Every minute of every day, His love pours out from heaven, to you and to me.
He has searched us and He knows us. He knows when we lie down and when we stand up and even before a word is on our lips, He already knows it. God is in the middle of our lives; every bit of our lives. Now that casts life in a whole new light.
Even though I am in full time ministry I still spend some time doing Information Technology consulting. It’s a bit like the Apostle Paul; it’s the tent ministry that help fund our ministry here at Christianityworks. And I can be sitting in meetings, talking about technologies and projects and stuff and today they have a sense of depth and meaning for me because I know that, even when my mind is focused on those mundane things, God’s in that place. He’s there with me. Everything I do, everything I say, is for His glory.
But the Psalmist takes this a whole level deeper – he tells us why – and that’s the heart of today’s message. Why does life have meaning for David? Why is it that he can know that God is in that place with him? Why is that knowledge of God just too wonderful for him; too lofty to attain? We are going to look at that ‘why’ in the second half of this Psalm.
So if you have a Bible, grab it. We are going to look at the second half of Psalm 139 after this short break.
Where Am I Going?
Ok, why is that David can be so profoundly delighted and confident that God is in the middle of his life? Let’s have a look at the second half of this Psalm 139 and see what lies behind David’s over-the-top exuberance. Beginning at verse 13, this is what it says.
“For you created my innermost being; you knit me together in my mother womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are so wonderful, I know that full well. My frame wasn’t hidden from you God, when I was made in that secret place; when I was woven together in the depths of the earth; your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God, how vast is the sum of them. Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of the sand. When I wake, I’m still with you.”
I love this! We all started life off in our mother’s wombs; in that dark hidden place, as a little speck in the depths of the earth. And God created our innermost beings. He knit us together in our mother’s wombs. We can praise Him because we are fearfully and wonderfully made. God made me who I am and God made you who you are. Who we are is His choice.
Now there are some bits that we like about ourselves and there are other bits that we don’t. And not only did He make us who we are, each strand of our DNA, according to the blue-print of His great and mighty heart, for you and me – not only did He do that, but He planned every day of our lives. “All the days ordained for me were written in your book before even one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God, how vast is the sum of them. Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand.”
You see, when we talk about being ‘the me I was meant to be’, first we have to understand, who I was meant to be. And who you and I were meant to be is what God made us to be – our looks, our abilities, the things that fire our hearts and our imaginations, the things that we like and that we don’t like.
You know, I grew up as a kid not liking beetroot and I still don’t like beetroot. It’s just something in me – I do not like beetroot. Why is that? Why is it that I don’t like beetroot and maybe you love beetroot? I don’t know but that’s how God made me. It’s just what He does. He makes each one of so wondrously different. The ‘me’ that I was meant to be is the ‘me’ that God created me to be and the same is true for you.
It’s not just karma. It’s not just the luck of the draw. It’s not some vague notion of chance or destiny. Your DNA – all the strands that scientists have spent trying to discover how our make-up is made up – all that stuff was laid down according to God’s blue-print, a blue-print that He crafted in His heart before time began.
A blue-print for our DNA, who we are and a plan for our days, who we are and what would happen. He knows every hair of our head, every thought, every desire, every dream, every hope, every hurt. Why? Because He knit us together in our innermost being. He was there when we were formed in our mother’s womb. You are who you are because not only that’s how He made you, but that’s how He deliberately, purposely dreamt of making you. And then He hand-crafted you to be who you are.
Is your heart delighted? Are you excited by what God planned for you before time began? So many people spend so much of their lives not liking themselves. But the truth about who we are is profound, it’s wonderful, it’s beautiful. All the time when we don’t like who we are, all the time when we try and be someone else because you look at the next person and they seem to have a great life so I’ll try and do what they do. All the time!
We are who we are because He, in His infinite wisdom and mercy and creativity, hand-crafted us. He planned us, He knew us and all our days were planned in His heart before time began.
Now let me challenge you today – let me get right in your face with this. Are you prepared to live every minute of every day in the wondrous knowledge that God hand-crafted you and all your days? If I want to be the ‘me’ that I was meant to be, I have to accept what God meant me to be. Let me say that again, because it’s so important. If I want to be the ‘me’ that I was meant to be, I have to accept what God meant me to be. He loves us just the way we are and for some of us, it’s time to do exactly the same thing.
Some people can never be the ‘me’ that they were meant to be because they haven’t accepted what God meant them to be. You know, I may want to be a basket-ball player, but I have to tell you, just quietly, between you and me, I’m not tall enough – I’m vertically challenged. And it doesn’t matter how much I want to be a basketball player, I will never be a basketball player; I’m the wrong shape.
Sure, we’ve all made mistakes and there are consequences that we are living out of those mistakes and people have scars and people have broken relationships. We will talk about some of those things next week on the programme. But fundamentally we are who we are, because God made us. We are no surprise to God and what we are going to do is no surprise to God. And in the middle of that, He wants to break in and help us to change and help us to deal with the hurts and the scars and the things of the past. And to bring us peace and rest. And you know something, there is going to be no peace and rest for you and me until we accept who we are and where we are.
When we know deep inside, “I am who He made me to be. This day, no matter what it brings, no matter how much it hurts, this day was set apart by Him before any day yet existed.”
It is time to love who we are – to honour God; to thank Him; to praise Him. “I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” He was there; His eyes saw your unformed substance and the problem is while we are living life, we forget that. And we so forget it that we forget how much He loves us.
We forget how His heart beats for us. His heart is to see us take His Scripture, His Word, into our hearts today. Don’t leave it there! Grab your Bible; spend some time in Psalm 139 with the Lord over this coming week. Let Him transform you. For me, this is at the centre of who I am. I come back here again and again, because here in this Psalm, I experience His healing stream of love.
What about you?
Comments