Who Are You Becoming Just to Feel Seen?

Jesus connects our trouble believing what God says with our hunger for other people's approval.

The word "honour" here means the approval and recognition people give one another.

In plain words, Jesus was asking how they could believe God while caring more about the praise people gave each other.

When I grew up I was the middle child of  four children. My older sister and brother the little sister seemed to get noticed, while I felt invisible in the middle.

I started getting into trouble because even bad attention felt better than none.

As a teen, o started smoking cigarettes.  One of my friends also introduced me to drugs.

That attention began teaching me how to act if he wanted to feel seen.

People laugh when we tear somebody down, so we get meaner.

A group accepts us when we join what they're doing. Soon, we start calling their behavior okay because we don't want to lose our place with them.

Most of us want to be seen. Trouble starts when other people's reactions decide who we become.

Jesus asks, "How can ye believe?"He isn't saying that wanting love is wrong. He's showing what happens when human approval becomes the focal point of your life.

The people around us can change their minds quickly. We need the Bible because what God says does not change with their reactions.

You may have started acting a certain way for attention so early that it feels normal now.

Maybe you're always the funny one because silence makes you feel invisible. Maybe you agree with things you hate because disagreement might cost you the group.

God sees the ways you learned to act when you felt invisible. His grace means we can tell Him the truth without hiding from Him.

In the end after I got saved I wanted to mentor young people the way I needed when he was young. God changed the direction of my life.

If people only celebrate you when you go against the Bible, their approval isn't helping you.

Are we seeking the honour that comes from God?

Jesus is asking whose approval matters most to us: people's or God's. When God's approval matters most, we can believe what He says even when people reward the opposite.

Here's how to find out whose approval is leading you:

1. Notice which version of you gets rewarded.

Pay attention to the behavior that gets laughs or access to the group. Ask whether that version of you agrees with the Bible.

2. Let Scripture challenge the approval.

Return to John 5:44 when belonging starts pulling you away from what God says. Pay attention to the word honour and ask whose approval you are chasing.

3. Choose one action that may never get applause.

Tell the truth when a lie would impress people, or leave a conversation that keeps pulling you backward. God sees the choice even when nobody else notices.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, I've let other people's reactions teach me who to become.

Show me which parts of my life are still performing for approval.

Thank You for seeing me fully and meeting me with grace.

Give me courage to believe Your Word when the room wants me to compromise.

Today I choose the honour that comes from You.

Teach me to become the person You are leading me to be, even when nobody applauds it.

In Jesus' beautiful name we pray. Amen.