Being Your Best
A Woman's Guide to Personal Excellence
By Dorothy Eaton Watts
We will be presenting this book to you in several parts. Today we will focus on the first part of Chapter One and will run this series until we complete the book. If you missed any of the parts, you can catch up on the reading by checking our archive listing.
CHAPTER ONE -- A Successful Woman - Part I
Amanda Smith was a success, a woman of excellence, an example of the kind of woman I'd like to be. Born a slave near the beginning of the nineteenth century, one of a family of 13, who lived through the deaths of several children and a first husband, as well as the instability of a second unhappy marriage.
Yet, Amanda's story is one of spiritual triumph and success. Despite her circumstances she became an internationally acclaimed missionary evangelist, preaching in England, India, Africa, and other parts of the world.
One well-known individual of that time said this about Amanda Smith: "She is a Christian of the highest type, and as a simple, confiding child of God has no superior among any women of our time." A minister who knew Amanda well referred to her as "God's image carved in ebony."
Once when Amanda stood to sing before an audience of women of rank and wealth, she suddenly realized that she was only a washerwoman with but two years of education, and she began to tremble.
How can I possibly go out there and sing in front of all those privileged women? Amanda thought. And then she remembered that her success was not to be measured in status, money, power, or position. Rather, it was to be measured in what she did with what God had given her. Her success was not to be counted by her position in the world, but by her position in Christ.
Amanda, told herself, I belong to royalty and am well acquainted with the King of Kings and am better known and better understood among the great family above than I am on earth.
She took a deep breath, walked out into the spotlight--her head held high--and praised God for all that was within her. Her concert was a success.
From that day new opportunities miraculously opened to Amanda Smith. She went through each door God opened and did her best to be all that He had gifted her to become. Amanda came that day to the place all successful women must come, the point of accepting her own self-worth. In those few moments as Amanda quaked backstage, she suddenly got a glimpse of who she really was in Christ--someone unique, created in the image of God, purchased by Jesus' death on the cross, and placed on earth to accomplish a work that no one else could do.
From the life of Amanda Smith I have learned five principles of successful living.
True success, on the other hand, begins with that sense of worth and uniqueness which comes from our position in Christ. We are already special, created in His image, and loved with an everlasting love. Success, then, becomes a striving to be all that God has already gifted me to become. Success is reaching toward my full potential in Christ Jesus. It is finding my place in His plan.
- I am somebody, a child of God, created in His image. "The Lord hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name" (Isa. 49:1).
"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be" (Ps. 139:13-16, NIV).
How unique I am! I was not made in Korea. There is no "Made in Brazil" label on me. I was fashioned in the darkness of my mother's womb by God's hand, created for a purpose, destined to walk onto the stage of the universe at this hour of earth's history. Success is discovering that plan and coming into harmony with it.
Amazing thought! While I was still but a microscopic cell, God arranged my DNA and lined up my genes and chromosomes to make me the special person that I am. There is none other like me among the 6 billion people living on Planet Earth. No one else has my distinct thumbprint, my distinct voiceprint, my special looks, my combination of gifts and personality.
If this is true, then what if I have a genetic disorder? Did God not know that when I was being formed, and does He not plan for my success, giving me a special work that He wants me to do in spite of my handicap? What if I find schoolwork difficult or have a shy temperament? Can He not work all things together for good, as He has promised in Romans 8:28?