Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying.
Romans 12:12 NLT
Self-esteem and confidence are seen as key measures of our well-being. Our self-esteem can be dented by various mishaps; from social and economic factors through educational experiences and our relationships. Low self-esteem can reduce our ability to handle future challenges.
Unexpectedly cast into the role of a primary carer in my late 30s, I suffered a collapse in my self-confidence. How was I to navigate this new, unfamiliar and unwanted path? It was clear that my hope in God was located in the immediate realities of my life, rather than any abiding reality that lay beyond my life experience now. And how might something that seemed so disconnected from my immediate experience be of any encouragement or help in the here and now? It was a season for discovering the realities of, and the benefits derived from, patience.
Patience is the “quality of being willing to bear adversities, a calm endurance of misfortune”. I was unwilling and wanted to throw off the practical constraints together with the emotional pain that accompanied waiting and being patient. Within my crisis, as my emotional outbursts, the collapse of my self-confidence and other human processes played out, I slowly discovered my hope in God put legs upon my distress. Patience gave me the limbs I needed to navigate this path. What’s more, patience opened up to me access to aspects of God’s love and purpose for my life I’d never seen before.
As I emerged from this bleak season 18 years later, I had discovered the blessing of patience. I entered on the path of the contemplative life. This was driven from my heart and not my head, an approach I had never taken before. There was no logic, simply a hope born of the experience of waiting.
QUESTION
How would you asses your self-confidence at present?
PRAYER
May I rejoice in the confident hope in Christ my saviour, and following his example, be patient in the face of challenge and suffering.
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