You are kind, You are smart, You are important.

Phil and I went on a little pre-bus call date last week and saw the movie "The Help". I read the book last year in about 2 days and although it took me a whole month to see the movie after it came out, I finally sat my tush down in the movie theatre seat to get my critic on and see how the movie version compared to the book.

I love it...I loved how the movie version met my imagination and in conjunction with my personality, seeing actual facial expressions was icing on the cake.

As I've been thinking about the movie this past week, I cannot seem to shake the multiple parts throughout the story where one of the maids Aibileen speaks specific words of truth over the toddler she cares for, Mae Mobley. The words come at perfect times when little Mae Mobley is quiet, confused, sad, scared, etc. Aibileen looks her in the eye and says to her, "You is kind, you is smart, you is important" and she has the sweet toddler repeat the words back to her.

My parents said plenty of great things to me growing up and sometimes it amazes me still at how easily insecure I can become, believing so many wrong, bad things about myself. What I love about the simple statement is that the words don't have anything to do with beauty or achievement...they are meant to be stored deep down, deeper than what my hair looks like today or how I feel about being a stay-at-home mom. I was born and so I am kind, I am smart, I am important.

I pray so much today that God's Spirit speaks these words over us. And as my kind, smart, important sister Camie turns 19 today, I want her to know deep down the value she holds in this crazy world. We need to see ourselves differently and we need to see other people differently.

Our eternal value outweighs EVERYTHING.