As humans, we are all gifted, beautiful creations. So why do we find it so hard to believe about ourselves?

It’s so easy to look at others and envy them. We envy their confidence, their beauty, their promotion, their popularity and so on. We compare ourselves to them and think we are lacking. This can provoke a constant drive through our actions for approval, or, conversely, it can lead us into inactivity, and fear of failure. One of the reasons we struggle to celebrate our uniqueness is that we have grown up hearing negative words spoken over us. It’s not that there isn’t a level truth in them – it has more to do with the negative slant they convey. These come through our parents, grandparents, carers, peers and teachers to name a few. We can be limited by them and not even realise it. We have believed these lies for so long, it doesn’t occur to us to question the truth of them. One of the words spoken over me was ‘gullible’:

gullible: adjective. too willing to believe or accept what other people tell you and therefore easily tricked, synonym naive (Oxford Dictionary)

As a child, I was not particularly popular but not friendless either. But I did suffer quite a bit of persecution. In appearance, I presented as a bony blond scrap with hazel eyes, a shy smile, severe excema and scarecrow hair. The excema was miserable and weepy in the cracks of my joints; my eyes deep and shadowed in their sockets with classic creases beneath. Add to the scabs, the hair. Even now, I can brush my hair and make it look quite nice and tidy but give it an hour or so and, whoah! What happened there? We recently had a lovely break in Devon. The beach and the wind had a field day crafting my neat plaits into a frenzied scrabble of wisps and knots. I think my hair exasperated Mum too as, in the guise of a treat, she had a proper hairdresser (salon visit and everything) cut it “to suit her face”. The resulting bowl-cut ensured I was mistaken for a boy for the next few years and compounded my belief that I was the most unattractive little girl on the planet. Recently, even my own son enquired, “Who’s that boy?”, looking through old family photos together. Wow.

Character-wise, I was trusting, passionate, fierce, selfish, bossy, truthful, creative, hated injustice and loved muddy stuff as much as dressing up. All of this wrapped up in an introverted, sensitive mindset. As such, I was often a rich source of entertainment to those around me; I was particularly easy to wind up. And the resulting fiery response from me was an irresistible temptation to my tormentors. Despite these apparent handicaps, I utilised my elder sibling status to the full, being simultaneously loyal and cruel to my younger sister (and the cat). And generally instructing anyone younger than me in the way things were to be done.

I loved reading and gobbled through The Magic Faraway Tree, The Wishing Chair, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (and all of Narnia really), The Box of Delights, Gobbolino the Witch’s Cat, The Borrowers, The Famous Five, The Dark is Rising (etc) and the Chronicles of Prydain (I can think of loads more with joy – happy days!). Plus a huge helping of fairytales: Ladybirds, Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson and The Colour Fairy books by Andrew Lang. Anything to do with magic, miniature, romance or adventure. My mind could easily believe in the existence of fairies, witches and magic. My sister and I would create tiny gardens or houses; spending hours imagining little people climbing up and living in the branches of our enormous conifer. One year, I bought a sugar mouse and resisted the (very strong) temptation to eat it. Instead, it was lovingly placed in a shoe box with a cardboard tube, some cotton wool for bedding and various random items to play with such as a plastic smarties tube lid. I pierced holes in the top and prayed to the fairies to make my mouse real. After a week I reluctantly accepted that they were unwilling to grant this particular request and I ate it.

I always got 50p from the fairies for my teeth, which were riches to me. One night I put my tooth in the little glass on the chest of drawers at the end of our bunk bed. I slept on the top. This time, I decided was going to wait up to see them come. I was still awake when, quite late into the evening, Mum came into the room with a pile of clean clothes to put away. I scuttled to the end of the bed to see if my tooth was still there – it was. Mum whispered ‘Go to sleep or they won’t come’. So I scrambled back under the bedclothes and closed my eyes. ‘Night, night, sleep tight’. Except that as soon as Mum pulled the door to the brick that kept it slightly ajar, I hastened to look once more. My eyes grew very wide – it was amazing! There, in the glass, was a brand new 50p instead of my pearly white. I was so excited I called out ‘ Mummy, Mummy! The fairies have been, we must have just missed them!’

Our family regularly attended a parish church, so I also believed in God and can’t remember a time when I didn’t. But God, to me, had a white beard, sat in the clouds and was always looking to tell you off. I was aware of Him as a sort of strict headmaster who could see everything you did and wasn’t always pleased with what He saw. But that began to change towards the end of primary school when I had the first experience (as far as I can remember) of answered prayer. I can’t remember why, but one playtime we were discussing the weather. I think it was to do with sports day and the weather forecast was for rain. The threat of cancelation loomed strongly so there was an air of disappointment. I said I would pray for good weather so that it could go ahead. I did, each day, for the next three days. And for those three days it was bright beautiful sunshine in spite of Michael Fish (or Jack Scott) on the BBC. I was in no doubt that God had answered my request favourably and I think my friends saw that too.

Through secondary school, the gullible nature in me was always getting me into difficulty. I would fall for tricks and pranks whilst failing to spot ulterior motives with monotonous regularity. I literally learnt to hate this aspect of my character. It made me feel weak and helpless. After these occasions, I would be sitting and crying with a friend somewhere, nursing my hurt feelings and the friend would be like:

“But you’re so gullible, you make it so easy!”

So, whilst I grew up believing in the unseen and hidden, I also grew to believe that it was wrong and childish to do so. That if I didn’t I would always be an object of ridicule. That, to be acceptable in society a normal person should grow out of it. Thankfully, I didn’t grow out of it, I couldn’t and didn’t want to. But I did ask God for wisdom. I still have a natural tendency to believe everything I hear, but I rely heavily on my understanding of God, His Word and Holy Spirit whispering in my ear to assess what is truth and what is a lie. I now know that saying “I am gullible” is a lie. I am not gullible. I am faith-full. The Lord has gifted me with a rather large slice of faith and all the while I was growing up, I was figuring out what it was and how to use it.

Each of us has these gifts and talents and we can so easily be robbed of them and therefore those around us are also robbed of what we bring. No-one else on the earth is like you. You are unique and wonderful. The Bible tells us in John 10:10 that the devil comes to steal, kill and destroy but that the Lord came so that we might have life and have it to the full. The devil will try to make us believe lies about ourselves through what others say about us. We can even help him by speaking those lies over others to. The power of life and death is in the tongue (Proverbs 18:21). We should be careful about what we say and what we hear.

The Bible states that without faith it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6). The enemy knew this and tried to undermine the very thing God gave me to enjoy rich relationship with Him (amongst other things). It is true that I still feel patronised on occasion and that some people I come across still think of me as gullible. But the difference is, that I no longer believe that about myself. I see it as a strength because the Word of God tells me it is and because by using this gift I have seen tangible results in my prayer life (Matt 21:22).

What words have been spoken over you? What do you really believe about yourself? How does what you think line up with what God says about you in the Bible? Ask God to show you His truth about you – what words is He speaking over you? Maybe the thing you despise the most about yourself has the potential to be your greatest asset.

Father God, thank you for creating us uniquely and so wonderfully. Help me to see myself the way You see me. Show me where I have believed lies. I am so sorry for believing that about myself and thank you for Your Word of truth about me. I forgive those that have spoken harsh words over me. Help me also to see others the way You see them. Give me the wisdom to discern Your patterns and gifts in myself and others. Put a love-guard on my mouth so that I can speak only words of life over myself and others. In Jesus name I ask.