Talents

Well, it's been a crazy two weeks here at NCU. I've been really busy with classes, homework, chapel services, various floor events, and attempting to maintain a bit of a social life. It's been great, it's been hard, and I can finally say I love it here. It's incredible being surrounded by people who have the same passion for Christ as I do. I love the atmosphere. I love everything about this place.

I have made quite a few friends since coming here and I am so grateful for each and every one of them because I know that God has placed them in my life to be such a blessing to me. They already are incredible blessings and it's just so cool to watch God bring more and more awesome people into my life.

God has been doing a lot in my life since I got here. If I sat here and wrote every single thing out, I wouldn't be finished until class tomorrow. I'm sure that over the course of the year, I will be posting about most of these things, but one in particular stood out to me tonight especially during our Life Core meeting: talents.

I'm not one of those girls that really struggles with self-image. That's just not me. Sure, I have my days when I don't feel as beautiful as I should, but I never sit and tell myself I'm fat or ugly or my nose is too big or something like that. That's just not me. God has blessed me with being able to see the beauty he has created me with, and I'm really glad for that. So tonight when we were doing our Life Core meeting, it was all about lies that you tell yourself or allow the Devil to tell you. Most of the girls in my group were writing things about self-image issues, but that wasn't what came to mind for me. What came to mind for me was my talents.

I think I have no talents. I'm not just saying that so that people can comment and tell me that I'm oh so talented, so don't think that. I'm just being real with you guys. I'm so hard on myself when it comes to talents. I suck at sports. I can't paint or draw or knit or do anything artsy to save my life. I can't sing or dance. I can't tell you a single thing about anything Science related. I'm good at school, yeah, but I'm not the best. I can write, sure, but so can a lot of people. It's nothing special. But God has really been working with me on this. He has been showing me that I do, in fact, have talents. Talents that I can use in my life. And He showed me in a pretty silly sounding way. For my Foundations of Leadership class, we had to take this test called the "Strength Finder" and these were my top five strengths:

1. Belief (sticking to a strong sense of values)
2. Developer (seeing the good in people)
3. Restorative (being able to deal with problems)
4. Input (finding interest and excitement in "the little things")
5. Futuristic (dreaming big and going after those dreams)

So after I got my results, I read a little bit about the strengths I have. And for the first time in my whole life, I saw my talents as something that was worth something. I saw them as useful. I saw how I could use them in the real world. For the first time ever, I felt like I actually had talents.

I know now. I know that God made me with many, many talents. I know that He sees those talents and is so proud of me when I use them for Him. I may not be able to play a sport, but I can ace a test. I may not be able to dance or sing, but I can move people with my words. I may not be able to paint a picture, but I can write a story. I can talk in front of people. I am passionate. I can dream bigger than most. I can stick to my values in hard times. I am compassionate. I am on fire for God. I run hard after what God has for me. I live my life with reckless abandonment.

It's really, really cool to finally see this; to finally see worth in my talents. I am so blessed and I am so glad God showed me this. It's really incredible. I hope you guys see it too, I hope you know that God made you with talents that are specific to His life plan for you. He doesn't make mistakes. He knows what He's doing. Remember that.

God bless.