Knit Together in Love

I spent the day yesterday at a baby shower. My best friend’s daughter is expecting her first baby. My friend lives several states away and couldn’t be there, so I felt like I was a bit of a surrogate for her. My friend and I raised our kids together, and there were many times that others mistakenly thought I was her daughter’s mother. I was honored to be there.

There is something special about babies. Someone said that a baby is God’s way of saying the world should go on. We know that babies are special to God. He takes special interest in knitting each of us together in preparation for birth.

You created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to pass. Psalm 139:13-16

As my son and daughter-in-law wait for the birth of their first baby, God is at work. He is intimately involved in the formation of my grandson, and in the writing of the story of his life. The work God is doing in preparation for his birth is amazing. I’ve seen the pictures. The tiny heart is pumping, and he is able to command the attention of a whole room of people simply by kicking or rolling over. He is not yet born, and yet the simple fact of his existence has caused joy and excited preparation.

So many of us suffer from low self-esteem. We don’t like our hair, or our skin is pimply or wrinkly, or we think our upper arms are fat. For some of us this causes depression. For others, we hold back being involved with others, feeling like we have little to offer. Walking through a crowded room takes herculean effort and a mustering of courage. We forget that the same God who is knitting my grandson together also knit us together. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. You are one of God’s wonderful works.

This is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. I John 4:9

God loved us first, before he began any re-creation of us, before we had any inkling of loving him. He loved us before we were born, and poured that love into weaving he was doing. We question God’s wisdom every time we look at ourselves and wish we had been made differently. We doubt his wisdom every time we allow self-doubt to keep us from reaching out to others.

I can hear you. “But you don’t know me. You don’t know the mistakes I’ve made, the things I’ve screwed up, or the way I’ve let God down. He may have made me, but I’ve made a mess of things since then.” I know you are thinking this, because I think the same things. I’m a screw up. I always have been. I’m the one who falls up the steps in front of the whole church, earning the nickname, “Grace.” I’m the one who let myself get fat, and who can’t seem to exercise the self-control to take the weight off. I’m the one who gets so nervous in front of crowds I once wet myself. I was six years old, but I still have that impulse every time I have to give a presentation. All that stuff is true, but it doesn’t matter. It’s just part of who I am. God didn’t make any of us perfect. He made us human. He made us exactly as we are supposed to be, perceived flaws and all.

We have been given this amazing gift of the knowledge that God created us exactly as he knew we should be. We can go forward in confidence, knowing that we are deeply and completely loved. When my hair is fuzzy, when my thighs are rubbing and my fat is jiggling, when I feel like everything I do is wrong, I can rest completely in the knowledge that God made me in his image, he knit me together exactly as he knew I should be, and he is working within me now, remaking me in the image of his Son. He is perfecting me, making me holy.

By one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.  

Hebrews 10:14

He has already made the sacrifice. We are perfect forever, and we are being made holy. What on earth do we have to feel insecure about?!