Just Be - Margo Woodward

Have you ever been told: You are enough. Life has a way of making us feel like we aren’t enough, like we have to do more and work harder to measure up to some imaginary, ever-changing standard. Books titled 10 Ways to get Rich and 10 Steps to a Better Life become national best-sellers. Why? Because we’re all trying to be something that we feel we’re not. We’re trying to make something happen. We’re trying to be bigger, badder, better. We feel it’s not enough to just be.

The world tells us to be assertive, take what’s yours, and be confident cocky to get what you want. If you believe it, you can achieve it. Right? Well, not always. Some things will just be, whether you believe it or not. On the other hand, some things will never be no matter how much you believe it. Lastly, some things will never be no matter how bad you want it, how much you believe it, or how hard you work for it.

It’s not always about us working, sometimes it’s just about us being. We have to learn to just be.

“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you- you of little faith?

– Matthew 6:28-30

Lilies don’t work to be lilies. They just are. Likewise, we don’t have to work to be who God has already created us to be. He has already made us. He made us in a particular fashion for a particular purpose. We are already made, we don’t need to try and remodel ourselves. He made us wonderfully, and marvelous are His works (Psalm 139:14).

Now, don’t take it out of context. I’m not saying we do nothing, or we become passive about life. That’s not the point. For we know that faith without works is dead, so we must do something (James 2:14). Only the Holy Spirit can provide us with the right balance of being & doing.

“Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.”

– Psalm 127:1

Our aim must be to do what the Lord has called us to do.

Our work in vain leads us to believe that we did something, when in actuality God did it- and it would have been done whether we toiled or not. Let’s not work in vain. Let’s:

Just be.

Esther was chosen to be queen. The king loved her above all the women and she obtained favor from everyone that saw her (Esther 2). That’s just how it was. And did I mention she had neither father nor mother?

Just be.

Solomon was chosen by God to succeed his father as king.
“Then Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king instead of David his father, and prospered; and all Israel obeyed him.”

– I Chronicles 29:23

He was chosen. He sat. He prospered.

Some things will just be, without any help from us. We have to learn to just be and know that what’s for us is for us. No one can take what’s ours and nothing can stop the plans of the Lord. Instead of trying to make things happen, let’s ensure that we have a heart that God can work with:

“But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.”

– I Samuel 16:7

We don’t have to work harder or try to be something that we’re not. We don’t have to try and make everything happen on our own. Honestly, some of the best things that we’ll receive in this life will be because of nothing that we have done. Consider salvation (Ephesians 2:8-9).