Christian Living

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On Being
©
by

Stephen A. Peterson


Whether a person is a female or male, child or adult, fat or skinny, great looking or plain, the most important thing is that everyone is a creation of God Himself. Each person has innate, inherited characteristics. However, much of what a person does is is shaped by their home environment and their world view. Every person evaluates themselves finding characteristics they like about themselves and characteristics they do not like. There are characteristics about person’s self that can be changed (and in some instances probably ought to be changed) and other things that cannot be changed. Regardless, God made every person and loves His handiwork even though others may not agree with the outcome. Yet God, in some way, calls every person to be His friend and follower—not as a slave but freely. By freely choosing to be a follower of Christ, a person will ultimately become the person they were created and meant to be.

Fadi, 11 years old, was brought to the United States from Iraq when he was 10 years old by his parents. When he first came to the United States, he was so frightened that he did not perform well in school nor did he make friends with children his own age. Everything Fadi had known had changed. He had to learn a new language, eat strange food, and live in a house different from the one he knew as a very young child. How could he be comfortable around children he could not understand? Would they hate him because he was different?

To help him adjust to his new country, Fadi’s parents purchased a television to let their son listen to English and get some idea as to how Americans lived, worked and played. Fadi would look at the television with wonder and amazement. Then he would look at himself in the bathroom mirror noting that in many ways he was similar to the American children who were eager to make Fadi their friend. He would even try speaking some of the words he had taught himself as wrote on the bathroom mirror.

Gradually, Fadi began to relax. He started laughing and enjoying the company of boys whose ancestors came from Europe, Africa or native to America before Columbus’ discovery. At last Fadi began to interact with other children as though he had lived in the United States all of his life. Fadi knew who he was, his family and where he now lived. He was now a citizen of the United States.

Everyone is a child of God even though there are many instances when people do not always behave like God’s child. God wants each person to know that they are loved and has really nothing to fear. We belong to God not because a person chosen God but because God has chosen them. Through the death of Jesus Christ, God has told everyone for all times that each person is loved because of what He did. Jesus even told everyone that death no longer has any power over them. That He would be with them for now and forever.

Like Fadi, God has given everyone everything he or she needs to recognize and come to know this love. Once a person has come to recognize God’s love and opens the doors of their minds and hearts using all of the gifts He has provided each person, they will live joyfully, in peace and share their joy and peace with others.

Like Fadi, those who are faced with the uncertainty of the foreign territory of their Christian life, often hide from the world out of fear and regret. They wonder who they are. The answer is a simple one. So simple it is hard to believe—“Beloved,” “a child of God,” “bought with a price and precious to God—each and every person regardless of their characteristics or circumstance their of birth!

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