The best version of yourself?

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"Be the best version of yourself." There are so many of these trite sayings floating around these days. Though many of them sound wonderful, they're all houses of cards.

It saddens me to think that countless people think they can build a life on these sayings when, in reality, they can't.  Not really.

Oh it may look and feel good.  It may even last for a bit.

But at the end of the day, any "best version" of ouselves we can muster on our own (translation - in the flesh) can never compare to the life that Jesus Christ gives us.

Jesus comes to live in us not to make us a "better version" of ourselves - heaven forbid!

No.  Jesus comes to take over.  Can you stand it?  But what happens to me, you may ask.  

That's the beauty of it!  As we surrender to Christ and allow Him full control in us, we not only become the best we can be, we become supernaturally equipped to face anything and anyone that comes our way. 

We do this in His all-powerful strength!

No matter how much love or strength or any other "good" quality we can muster up on our own, there simply is no comparison to the love, peace, strength, joy, and so on, that Jesus gives to us when we belong to Him fully.

I can sniff it out imeediately - a person who is full of self - even their "best" self - and a person who is filled with Christ.  

There's a subtance to a Christian who is filled with the Holy Spirit.

There's a shallowness to those who are filled with themselves only.

We can choose. 

Even as Christians filled with Christ, at any given moment we can choose to try and be our "best" selves in our own strength (like the world, walking in the flesh), or we can allow Jesus to live His life through us.

The difference is as far as the east is from the west.  One is not like the other.  At all.

Even at my "good girl," sweetest, smartest self, I could never be the person that God created me to be - one filled with His overflowing grace, wisdom, peace, joy, love, patience, goodness, self-control and all of that other genuine stuff that only Christ can supply.

So please, for heaven's sake, don't waste your time trying to cultivate some phony "bset version" of yourself and instead give yourself completely to Christ.

You will not lose yourself. You will find yourself.

Lord Jesus, thank You that I don't have to muster up a false sense of self to please myself or others.  Thank You that I can be totally free in Your grace and Presence as I let You live Your life in me.  When I do, I don't even think about myself!  I just am.  And the result is the most genuine "version" of myself that You could create!  Life is so much better when surrendered to You, sweet Jesus.  In Your Name.  Amen.

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