We Can't See It

I was talking with a friend yesterday because that's what friends do. They talk.

I was sharing some things I don't really like about myself and at one point she pointed out that we often can't see the things that other people love about us. She said (paraphrased) "there are things I love about you and you can't see them."

Such a simple statement. I don't think she could know the profundity of it in that moment she spoke it.

I can't see what it is people love about me? I wonder why that is? Is it because I am so often alone with my own thoughts? And I know my own thoughts?

Why are we sometimes so blinded to the good things about us? Why is it that I am so apt to see how selfish I am? That I so easily focus on my shortcomings?

I mean, if someone calls himself our friend, there obviously must be something that they like about us. I don't normally call myself a friend of someone I don't really like, you know? So, I must have likable parts.

I shared in my SaLT group years ago that I had always felt that I was a good and decent person, but since becoming a Christian (April 4, 1999 - Yay! Today's my born again birthday! I'm 9!) I feel like I am a worse person now. I feel as though I was a better person before I knew the Lord. One wise woman of the Word shared with me that day that when we become Christians our eyes are opened to sin, and the impact of sin. "The closer we get to God, the more 'ick' we see in ourselves". She wasn't saying that to affirm that I was "icky", but rather to teach me that like Isaiah, "I am a man of unclean lips", but went on to explain that we shan't call anything impure that God has made clean. When God looks at me, He doesn't see my "ick", He sees me filtered through His Perfect Son.

I need to get over myself.