FIVE FIERCE TRUTHS is a new five-part series for your Fierce Calling journey…

FIERCE TRUTH #2: YOU Have Fierce Confidence Through Christ

“For You are my hope; O Lord God, You are my confidence from my youth.” Psalm 71:5

Have you ever felt mortified in front of a roomful of people?

I think we can all relate to leaving the ladies room dragging toilet paper on our shoe, or sporting that big ol’ piece of spinach stuck right between our two front teeth.

But I’m talking about those times when we wish a trap door would open up beneath us or the Starship Enterprise would beam us up.

I remember one such time…

The Duet

I am a lover of music.

It’s no surprise to anyone raised in American that my first instrument was the recorder. I’m thinking it was yours, too?

But that brown plastic toy-like-music-maker could not compare to my next instrument–the classic silver flute. The melodious flute was soothing and lovely, but I was a fickle one. My true heart’s desire was to play the piano.

Fast-forward about twelve years and that desire became a reality. A friend at work was moving and guess what she was selling? Her beautiful, upright piano. I was delighted to take it off her hands.

Beyond excited, I immediately contacted our worship leader, Tim, who offered lessons. As a working wife and mom, practicing at home was a challenge, but I found nooks and crannies of playtime throughout the week.

A few months before Christmas, Tim decided it would be fun to perform a duet at church during worship. We practiced Go Tell It on the Mountain for weeks, and when the day to play rolled around, we were ready.

That morning as we sat down at the piano, something went terribly wrong. It was as if I had been hit over the head and suffered amnesia. You’d think I’d never seen a piano before.

It was more than just stage-fright, it was like my brain had been washed clean of every note I’d ever learned.

Sadly, the duet we had practiced for weeks became a solo. Tim was quite gracious and I was quite mortified! I’m not sure if anyone else knew what was happening since he covered my part so well, but I knew and I never forgot it.

To this day, I still cringe a little when I hear that song. I’ll put a positive spin on it though, by remembering how you’ll now think of me every time you hear it. I’m kidding! Kind of…

Why Self-Confidence Leads to Self-Sabotage

So what went array on duet-day?

I lost confidence because I misdirected my focus. I focused too much on myself and my prideful thoughts of wanting to be perfect. I lost my confidence–because my confidence was in myself.

It can happen in our walk with Christ, too. We lose confidence in what we’re called to do because we are focusing on the wrong kind of confidence. We are focusing on the world’s definition of confidence.

As I recall, there are plenty of instances in the Bible where people nearly missed their calling because of their own insecurity. They had to trade their failing self-confidence for a victorious godly-confidence. Once they placed their trust in God, He did exceedingly abundantly more than they could ever fathom.

Here’s what Merriam-Webster has to say about confidence:

“A feeling or consciousness of one’s powers or of reliance on one’s circumstances.”

On duet-day, I was feeling pretty powerless and may as well have been unconscious.

Aren’t you glad that God has a better definition of confidence? The right kind of confidence is being confident we can do all things through Christ (Philippians 4:13).

In Merriam-Webster’s defense, we also find this definition of confidence:

“The quality or state of being certain.”

Kind of sounds like the definition of faith, doesn’t it?

We can be confident through our faith in Christ. We can be confident in who God says we are. We don’t need to rely on our circumstances, we need to rely on the Holy Spirit.

We have been empowered by the Holy Spirit and we can ask Him to help us. If I would have remembered that on duet-day, this story may have gone much differently.

We can be confident that the Holy Spirit will help us know what we need to know so we can do what we need to do.

Being Confident in This Very Thing…

God will complete the good work He began in you. In that, you can be confident. God is doing a work in you and in me. If we rely on our own power we’ll flounder every time.

“For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” Philippians 1:6

And we need to shut-down those crazy voices in our heads and peel off the false-identity labels.

With God’s help, we can peel off the labels slapped on us by others and by ourselves, that we’re worthless, ugly, stupid, incapable. When we remove the labels we can be free to be who God created us to be and do what He calls us to do.

Maybe you don’t wear any of those labels, but someone you know does. God is the lifter of our head and we can walk in confidence knowing He equips us in our everyday life.

Finding Your Confidence in Truth

In my awkward tween years, I felt like a shadow-girl. What do I mean by that? I felt like I was always in the shadow of someone else—someone better, prettier, smarter, stronger, braver…

I don’t know if you can relate to that or not, but that’s how I felt.

When we allow ourselves to feel less than, we pull away from the flock and retreat to the shadows. The enemy looks for the ones who wander away because a loner is easily picked off. 

A lack of confidence is like the scent of fresh meat to a hungry carnivore.

When we isolate ourselves away from our brothers and sisters in Christ, we are prone to believe lies. Lies like we are insignificant and our voice doesn’t matter. But through Christ our life has significance and He wants to use our voices.

We know the truth and we have the mind of Christ. We can stop those thoughts the enemy puts into our head because the truth is, we are never going to be good enough, smart enough, strong enough, and brave enough because we are humans being sanctified day by day. Isn’t that a relief?

We will never arrive until we reach glory, so instead of saying, "I’m not enough" say, "I don’t need to be enough because Jesus is enough for the both of us." Click To Tweet

Our worth is in Christ, our value is in Christ, and only through Him are we enough. When we take the focus off of our own shortcomings, we find it is through those shortcomings God’s power in us shines through.

YOU, my friend, HAVE FIERCE CONFIDENCE THROUGH CHRIST.

IT’S TIME TO BELIEVE IT, SHOW IT, OWN IT, AND USE IT FOR GOD’S GLORY.

Do you believe it?

Good, but we still have work to do.

FIVE FIERCE TRUTHS About You Part III is up next week:

FIERCE TRUTH #3: YOU HAVE FIERCE COURAGE IN CHRIST

Call to Action

Make that call this week to that person on your heart. The Holy Spirit brought them to your mind for a reason. You have fierce confidence through Christ and the Spirit will tell you what to say. Just say it…

Until then, blessings to you, friend! Embrace your fierce confidence through Christ.

Peace & Love in Him,

Doris