A prominent passage of scripture is found in chapter one of Jeremiah where God was having dialogue with Jeremiah and the conversation went like this:

Jeremiah 1:4-7 (NIV) The word of the Lord came to me, saying,
5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”
6 “Alas, Sovereign Lord,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am too young.”
7 But the Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you.

This scripture is interesting because it shows that God wants to converse with us. It also shows that He wants to dispel unwanted and damming thoughts from our mind and replace them with right thinking (Romans 12:2), but only if we allow Him.

What also jumped out at me is when God rebutted Jeremiah’s words, with Truer Words of, “Do not say, ‘I am too young”. God had this great and mammoth task for Jeremiah but he was thinking he was too young, too unqualified, too ill equipped and might I say too unworthy. Does this sound familiar? Well it sure does for me at many instances throughout my life. Most recently it would have been when I wrote my first book (What is the Woman Saying – Lessons from Biblical Women). I say first because God willing, there might be more to come 😊.

Countless number of times while penning this book I thought about giving up! The amount of times I spoke words of doubt and fed myself with negative, “I am too’s…”. God had assigned this work for me to do but there I was, killing it because I did not believe I was worthy enough or had the ability. In the same vein, I am sure that someone who is reading this blog today is speaking words of discouragement to themselves in some situation or endeavour and this must stop!

I like what Laird Hamilton said when he coined the following:  

“Make sure your worst enemy is not living between your own two ears.”

Is not this a fitting quote, for a truth we are our own worst enemy at times. We look around and often pay attention to our external enemies, but what about the one which resides closest to us – the one between our ears.  Listening to this negative voice can be detrimental to us. Allow me to share a situation which happened to a friend recently to underscore this point and prove why rejecting our internal naysayer is important.

My friend was working for years in the retail supermarket industry. Then she left Trinidad about 4 years ago and went to the united states to seek better opportunities and got a job in the same supermarket sector with a small retailer. Then about 4 months ago Amazon contacted her to attend an interview as a Warehouse Manager which is a totally different field altogether.  She applied for the job but had serious doubts and fears. She discussed it with her son and both of them decided that this job is not for her given her background. So, she wrote back to Amazon and told them that she is not interested. Then she received and auto-response email from the HR coordinator at Amazon indicating that he is on vacation.

As God would have it, this Amazon HR coordinator already scheduled the interview before he left and the first interviewer called my friend and she attended the interview. At that interview, the first interviewer stated that her background is not a 100% match for the position. Anyway, she passed that interview and moved to a second and third interview with everyone telling her the same thing at each stage (you are not a 100% match). But as God would have it, in the final analysis, she got the job in a sector that is mainly foreign to her.

She is now working for a prominent company with a much better salary. Amazon also paid all her moving expenses, flew her to the new state where the job is located, and gave her a signing bonus. Wow, now tell me if that wasn’t ALL God! Although she doubted at instances, could you imagine if she had fully listened to that negative inner voice or  the voices of those around her?

Today I want to encourage everyone to never say that your are too weak, too tired, too unqualified, too lacking in finances or too anything … What we have to do is trust in the Lord for He is our strength and if we need anything then come to Him because He gives seed to the sower (2 Corinthians 9:10). All we have to do is put ourselves in a position to sow/give and God will provide the resources (seed).

I close by saying, make sure the inner voice (positive) that speaks to you is stronger than the outer voices (negative) that talks to you. Remembering:

I am who God says I am, and I can do what God says I can do.

PS: Dane Miller was last seen reading scriptures to remind himself of what he can do in God.

Note: after posting this blog my Aunt sent me the following video to which I decided to include.

Your Brother in the Lord,

Dane Miller | Author

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