Are you B.A.D.?

This will not be news to some of you, but I REALLY struggled in Jr. High and high school. I felt like I didn't fit in. I didn't feel accepted except for my small group of friends and even some of those depended on the day. In today's current language, I had "low self esteem". Still do some days. I try to rah rah girls with encouragement now as they tread those same waters. I try to remind them that this is a blip in time in the whole scheme of things....but it sure doesn't seem like it when you're going/growing through it. Looking back I have since learned that lots of us felt that way. Some just covered it up better than others. Maybe some of us still do.

Fast forward to yesterday and I'm at McDonald's with my daughter. I go to pay for my order with my trusty debit card and the word quickly flashes across the screen: ACCEPTED. There are days I don't feel like I accept myself.....and I'm accepted by my bank and McDonald's?

How have I forgotten? Yikes. I let today's worries and concerns move me far from the truth. I am accepted every day, every way by God. Through that acceptance, I am to accept others. Release them from my expectations.

^{Romans 15: 7} (NIV) Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.

Then I get home and check Facebook for a few minutes (ha!). A friend's status shuffle refers to B.A.D. : Blessed and Delivered. I made it: God's B.A.D. girl - Blessed, Accepted, Delivered. In this case, bad can be good. So, are you? B.A.D. I mean.

Do not fall for the doubts that can easily plague us. Move beyond self esteem. Remember you're already accepted. Get it past your head and emotions and into your heart and soul. God's already there just waiting for you to show up!

1Peter 2:^{9-10 (The Message)} But you are the ones chosen by God, chosen for the high calling of priestly work, chosen to be a holy people, God's instruments to do his work and speak out for him, to tell others of the night-and-day difference he made for you—from nothing to something, from rejected to accepted.