Do you struggle with confidence? There seems to be a universal quest for self-confidence. Books, blogs and videos flood the market on the subject. There is a key ingredient that actually plagues obtaining true confidence: pride. In many cases, everything is about the self and looking good in whatever arena a person finds his or her self. The one crucial component required for true confidence is humility. Humility knows the true source of greatness. It does not put trust in the self; humility puts its trust completely in God.
If you are born again, you have Holy Spirit dwelling within you. That also means God’s grace is available to enable you to do the things you couldn’t do on your own. In short, put your confidence in God Who dwells in you. Remember, He also gave you gifts and talents to do amazing things. The gifts work, you merely need to cooperate with them. Cooperation may indeed require preparation on your part. That is a way of exercising your gifts. If you never put them to work, so to speak, you may find it a little awkward using them. If God has called you to do something, then He made the provision to fulfill it already. He equipped you for the assignment.
These things are not limited to the things pertaining to church as it were. For instance, the Lord may call you to a particular occupation. That means if you’re embarking on a new job or business venture, He made it possible for you to carry out the tasks that accompany your position. You will be able to obtain the proper knowledge necessary for the job, if you don’t already possess it. Of course, His wisdom is always available for the asking (see James 1:5-8). Not only that, His favor goes before you. To be sure, there may the trying of your faith attached to it, which means there may be a rough patch or two involved. Those rough patches often reveal that He indeed called you there, because you survived and actually thrived in the trials. It also shows He is on the throne, and His mercies are new every morning. That trying of your faith is precious (see 1 Peter 1:6-9). There are numerous things you can learn from these experiences, as long as you remain teachable.
You need not focus on the fear of failure. When you concern yourself with avoiding mistakes, you will be fixated on them, and tend to make more. On the other hand, focusing on excellence will actually help you make fewer mistakes, and better position you to learn from any you could possibly make. A mistake is not a death sentence; it is an opportunity to grow. Incidentally, this principle works the same way as relating to sin. If you focus on not sinning, per se, you will become sin-conscious. The flip side, is knowing your righteousness is in Jesus Christ, and by focusing on Him, sin is no longer an issue (see Romans 6:1-23; 2 Corinthians 5:21). Of course, there is much more that could be said on that particular subject.
One other key ingredient is love. Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18), and faith works by love (Galatians 5:6). When your inspiration is love, you’ll have the proper motivation to succeed. Love vacates the need to fulfill self-interests. It focuses outwardly. When you do things for love’s sake, confidence will not be an issue. Because of your love for God, you will gladly obey His calling. Because of your love for others, you’ll be more concerned with building them up than trying to look confident. Self-confidence in the worldly sense is based on pride; whereas, confidence in God is an act of humility that you enables you to walk confidently.
Daniel 11:32 The people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits.
Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.
