It Is Either True or It Is Not

There is a quiet moment that comes for every one of us. It rarely arrives with thunder. More often it shows up at the kitchen sink, or in the car after a hard day, or in the bathroom mirror before the world wakes up. It is the moment we have to decide, honestly and for ourselves, whether God's Word is true.

Not true in theory. Not true for other people. True for us.

I have stood in that moment more than once. And I have learned that answering yes is only the beginning, because yes carries a weight we don't always expect.

The Stories We Love to Believe

Most of us who have spent any amount of time near a church pew can tell the stories by heart. The Israelites marching around Jericho for seven days, trumpets sounding, and the walls falling flat (Joshua 6). A shepherd boy with five smooth stones and a sling, facing a giant the whole army was afraid of, and winning (1 Samuel 17). The promise that Jesus is coming back for us. (John 14)

We believe those. We teach them to our children. We sing about them. We would defend them if someone challenged us.

But here is where I had to get honest with myself: it is easy to believe God can do miraculous things for a whole nation, or for a boy in a valley thousands of years ago. It was much harder to believe what He says about me.

The Verses We Quietly Skip

The same Bible that tells us about Jericho also says, "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139:14).

The same Bible that tells us about David and Goliath also says, "So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them" (Genesis 1:27).

The same Bible that promises Jesus' return also says, "For we are God's masterpiece" (Ephesians 2:10).

And somehow those are the verses we read past. We nod at them. We put them on coffee mugs and pretty prints. But when we are alone with our thoughts, we struggle to believe them. We believe the voices that say we are too much, not enough, too broken, too far gone, too ordinary.

I know that voice well. There have been seasons when I could quote Scripture about God's power with total confidence, then turn around and speak to myself in a way I would never dare speak to another person. I believed God could part a sea. I struggled to believe He had done anything special when He made me.

I wish someone had told me sooner: that is not humility. That is unbelief wearing humility's clothes.

You Cannot Pick and Choose

Here is the truth I keep coming back to: God's Word is either true or it is not. We either believe it or we do not.

We don't get to walk the buffet line of Scripture, filling our plate with the parts that feel comfortable and leaving the rest. We can't say, "Yes, Lord, I believe You parted the red sea" and in the same breath say, "But You're wrong about me." We can't celebrate the lions who were held back and dismiss the hands that knit us together in our mother's womb.

If He was telling the truth in Joshua, He was telling the truth in Psalm 139. If He was faithful in the Valley of Elah, He is faithful in the words He has spoken over you. The same God. The same breath. The same Word.

When we decide to believe some of God’s word but not all of it, we aren't being realistic. We are quietly placing our own opinion above His.

What Faith Actually Is

Hebrews 11:1 says, "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see."

Notice what that verse does not say. It does not say faith is confidence in what we already feel. It does not say faith is assurance once we finally see the evidence in the mirror.

Faith is believing it before you see it.

You may not see yourself the way God sees you. Not yet. Maybe not today, maybe not this year. You may look at your story and see the failures, the losses, the season you would rather forget, the habits you can't seem to break. You may look at your reflection and see only what is missing.

But faith was never about what you see. It is about who said it.

Who Are You to Call Him a Liar?

This is the question that stopped me in my tracks, and I offer it to you gently, because I needed it gently too.

When God says you are fearfully and wonderfully made, and you answer, "No, I'm not," what are you really saying?

You are telling the Creator of the universe that He got it wrong. That He misjudged His own work. That on the one subject He knows better than anyone, you know better.

Numbers 23:19 reminds us that God does not lie. Romans 3:4 goes further: "Let God be true, and every human being a liar."

Every human being. That includes the voice in your own head.

I don't say this to shame you. Shame is not the point; freedom is. When we finally agree with God about who we are, something loosens in our chest. We stop striving to earn a worth that was already given. We stop shrinking back from the calling He placed on us. We stop treating His promises as if they belong to everyone but us.

Ephesians 2:10 doesn't stop at calling us God's masterpiece. It goes on to tell us that we were created anew in Christ Jesus to do the good things He planned for us long ago.

Our identity isn't something we earn by doing enough good things. It is the foundation upon which we build our life with Jesus.

Choosing Yes, All the Way

So here is my invitation to you this week.

Pick one verse you have been reading past. Just one. Maybe it is Psalm 139:14. Maybe it is Ephesians 2:10. Write it somewhere you will see it every day: the bathroom mirror, your dashboard, the lock screen of your phone.

Every time you read it, say it out loud with your name in it. "I, ____, am God's masterpiece." It may feel awkward. It may even feel false. Say it anyway. Faith often speaks before feelings catch up.

You already believe the walls fell. You already believe the giant went down. You already believe He is coming back.

Now believe Him about you.

It is either true or it is not.

I have decided it is true. All of it. Every word. Even the ones about me.

Will you?