My daughter loves to watch America's Next Top Model. I think her fascination is partly my fault.... I love reality tv. Not something I am proud of, but something I don't hide either. She's funny how she watches it, with all of her pragmatic and teenage attitude hung out there. The girls that whine get on her nerves, the mean-girls should be sent home immediately and she is often rooting for the underdog. The girl that is a little awkward, who's beauty isn't the obvious, jaw dropping, glamorous type but just simply takes your breath away in a photo is usually her favorite.
There is always a segment or even an entire episode devoted to "the walk." Besides taking stunning photos, these gals have to be able to walk down a runway in monstrous heels and incredible fashion contraptions to be able to be a "top model." Some of them are elegant, some are sassy or sexy and others clump down the runway like a moose on stilts. The coaches are often appalled at some of the walks they see and it does make for some very entertaining evenings. What makes it even more entertaining is the way that the girls will defend their particular style and even try to perfect it. They are non-plussed when told they "clump" or "stomp," it simply doesn't phase them. They are confident and controlled, knowing that in an industry that can chew them up and spit them out they need to find a way to stand out. If walking down a runway like some stampeding animal gets them looked at, they are perfectly willing to do just that. They are incredibly comfortable in their own skin. They like themselves, they don't kvech about being too this or too that, they don't whine about wanting more of anything, they just are and they are happy to be that. Ah, youth... But I digress.
There is a saying, "Happiness lies in wanting what you have, not in having what you want." You've met those kinds of people, haven't you? Those souls that have a calming effect on a room just by walking into it? If you look closely at them you may find that they aren't a perfect size two, or drop dead gorgeous by today's model standards. You may actually find that they don't differ greatly from the other people you regularly interact with, at least on a physical level. But you will notice that they have something the others don't have and that is a quiet confidence married up with humility, grace and patience. I know... Hits you where you live, doesn't it? It does me.
God wants us to get there too. He's our coach for our runway walk. He isn't trying to mould us into the same girl or boy, time after time. He wants us to strut our stuff just as we are, with confidence in His ability to use it, no matter what we think we are capable of. He wants to get credit as the designer, for certain, but He also wants us to remember that our uniqueness is our gift, direct from Him.
Each of us has a gift that God has given us to use in our lives. It's incredibly selfish and unfair of us to think that we all should have the same gifts, in the same order and same quantity as everyone else. We all have abilities given by the Father to do work He has designed for only us to compete. My level of humility will look different from my friends', and their grace will look different from mine, but I believe that God gives us each a measure of all of these things to use in our walk in order to bring Him glory. If we Christians all looked the same, it would be rather discouraging. I can tell you that I would never have accepted Christ if I had had to become some quiet, sit-in-the-corner personna that is a mere shadow of who I really am. Likewise, I know plenty of women who would die in their shoes if you told them that to be a Christian they had to stand up in front of every person they ever met from there on out and proclaim the Gospel loudly and forcefully. Luckily, God doesn't ask us to do that. He tailors our walk to the gifts He gives us and asks only that we respond in obedience.
God gives us what we need, when we need it. Our job is to want what we are given. We have to start deciding that our attitude is one of contentment in our gifts, no matter what others have around us, and a willingness to use those gifts however the Father decides is best. THAT is how we work it and strut our stuff! What part of your runway walk is God working on today?
No comments:
Post a Comment