As I sat in the audience listening to a gifted, well-known speaker, fear began to overtake me.  I was one of three speakers at that weekend conference, and I was totally unknown.    The voices in my head began to say, “What are you doing here?  You can’t compete with her.  You have nothing to say.  You will put people to sleep.”

I literally went to the head of the conference and said, “She practically covered my whole message, so you can just give the women the afternoon off.  I’m okay with that.”

She replied, “No!”

When my session rolled around, my feet felt like cement blocks as I walked up on the stage and to the podium.  I wanted to cry, and I wanted to run away.    Though I had sought God, prepared a message and dressed just right (hey, I am a girl), I wanted to go home.  I had little faith in my ability.

I opened the Bible, read the scripture and then began to speak what God had given me.  The response was amazing.  Once I was done, and went back to my seat, all I could say was thank you, God, for believing in me when I did not even believe in myself.

While I very much believe in positive confession of who we are, and who Christ is in us, there are times that life can weight you down. God doesn’t give up on you when your confession isn’t perfect.  In the book of Judges, a man named Gideon felt totally defeated. His confession was basically, “I’m just a big weakling who can’t do anything.” God, through an angel, said, “I don’t think so.” Well, actually He said, “You are a mighty warrior.”

When Gideon listed all the reasons he was disqualified to be used by God, God rejected Gideon’s small view, and said to him as recorded in Judges 6, “Then the Lord turned to him and said, “Go with the strength you have, and rescue Israel from the Midianites. I am sending you!” “But Lord,” Gideon replied, “how can I rescue Israel? My clan is the weakest in the whole tribe of Manasseh, and I am the least in my entire family!” The Lord said to him, “I will be with you. And you will destroy the Midianites as if you were fighting against one man.”

Gideon went on to be the mighty warrior that God said he was.  The key to his success?  God was with Him.  God paid no attention to what Gideon thought of himself, or what others thought of Gideon.  What mattered is that God promised to be with him.  God did not expect Gideon to do it in his own strength.   God sees us not as what we are, but what we will be when His power is upon us.   Accomplishing great things is not about who I am, but about who God is.

Take another long look in that mirror, and see who God sees.  Over your life, God confesses, “Mighty warrior!”   He sees you much greater than you see yourself.