Some people show off their beauty because they want the world to see it. Others try to hide their beauty because they want the world to see something else.
And what do you see?
(pause) Everything.
Somewhat cheesy quote from Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Don’t judge me)
I just had a Jesus rant and I think I can blog now.
We are a team of four women. The other night we watched the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and decided who each of us were most like among the four friends: Tibby, Lena, Bridget, and Carmen. I got Lena, the timid Greek girl who tries very hard to keep her heart behind high brick walls. (And she likes art, just like me.) I had to admit, it was pretty accurate. Except I don’t wear skirts nearly as often as she does.
I have several factors contributing to my own walls and my recent struggle with apathy. I am so accustomed to having the luxury of sticking my head in the sand whenever I want and not caring about anyone else but myself. It is so easy, so comfortable. But I have rediscovered recently that my heart is not mine to barricade. It is His to guard, but not mine to barricade.
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.
Proverbs 4:23
Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
I Peter 4:8
You are not your own; you were bought at a price.
I Corinthians 6:19b-20a
In Ecuador, I found out that after years and years of trying so hard to win everyone’s approval, including my own, that I didn’t have to. God accepts me anyway, as I am.
What I did not realize in Ecuador was that He loves me too much to leave me that way.
I have felt absolutely wretched for the past two months. (I love that word, “wretched”. It’s so descriptive. Even the way it rolls off your tongue contributes to its deliciousness.) At first when I found out I could stop trying, it was delightfully freeing. But then, I just felt like dirt. Without the need to prove myself to God, I had kind of accidentally “freed” myself from caring about who I was and who I was growing into.
And valuing Whose I was.
You see, there is no such thing as a normal person. Each one of us is inherently beautiful beyond compare, valuable beyond what we can fathom, made worthy, prized, cherished, lovingly cared for. Worthy of dignity and respect. Made capable and powerful. Like Lena, truly and fully seen and known. Even with the ugly things we do, we are loved like absolutely crazy. Ponder those words for a minute. Do we actually believe them? Do we act like we believe them?
Do we believe Him?
I have been given power in Christ to take authority and ownership of my identity in Him and not to be satisfied with being stagnant. To act like who and Whose I actually am.
A priceless treasure.
How different would this world be if everyone really believed their true value and acted accordingly? We are not victims of our failures. We are given power to overcome them because He overcame everything.
Don’t you ever let someone tell you that you are not enough, that you aren’t worth anything, that you won’t ever amount to much, that you are anything less than you are. They probably say that because they have been told it about themselves before. Hurt people hurt people. But the cycle can stop as soon as we realize our true worth.
So my final conclusion about my own struggle with apathy:
It hurts to care. It hurts so much. But it hurts more to be numb, to not care, to stay like I am, to choose to be stagnant instead of following Him. And I really do love Him, and I really do want to obey Him and seek Him. I don’t really care how crazy it looks to anyone else.
BRING IT ON. #courage
