As a professional Weed-Puller, I have had more than enough experience with weeds and their nefarious ways. A few times a week, my team and I fearlessly attack the growths that vie for control of the church’s garden. Throughout our many hours spent eliminating these pesky plants, I have noticed that weeds and lies have a lot in common. For example, they both:
1. Spring up overnight
2. Can be hard to see until they become a big problem
3. Keep coming back until you get rid of the root
4. Spread like nobody’s business
5. Are ugly
6. Make it more difficult to see the beauty of the creation that they are assaulting
Sometimes, it takes another person to help you see the lies that have taken root in your mind. At least, that was the case with me.
The deception was so deep that I didn’t even want to admit that it existed. I lived in a fantasy of my own construction, happy to pretend that I actually believed what I thought that I should, all the while assuming that I saw things clearly. It wasn’t until one night when my team and I were watching a movie that I finally admitted what I really thought to God and, the next day, to a teammate.
All my life, I have been taught that people are created in the image of God. That part, I believed. I have also been taught that everyone is created to be beautiful, which I believed as well…to an extent. I knew that everyone is created beautifully on the inside, that their God-given design is distinct and ingenious. That night, though, as we watched the movie flicker across the computer screen and I battled the thoughts that compared myself to the gorgeous actress, I allowed myself to face the heartbreakingly ugly truth for the first time:
I didn’t think that everyone was equally beautiful on the outside, too.
It was something that I had fought for so long, something that made me feel horribly guilty. I had covered up my true standpoint, trying to find things that were beautiful about every person. But once the thought was out there, I couldn’t take it back.
Later, I lay awake in my tent, thoughts spinning out of my brokenness. I didn’t understand why it was that important to me, but I kept asking God a single question: Why? Why would you make some people beautiful on the outside but not others?
He answered. The following day, I was having a conversation with Kaitlyn, our team leader. I explained my thought process to her and finally admitted what was in my heart: “I just don’t understand why God would make some people gorgeous on the outside and others…not.”
She paused for a second, looking confused. “He didn’t.”
It sent a shockwave through my heart, and yet I knew that it was exactly what I had needed to hear.
The concept was revolutionary to me: What if God did create everyone equally but uniquely beautiful? What if the world confines the definition of beauty to a few words when there is a whole dictionary out there, waiting to be seen?
I had known to some degree that the world limits beauty (to being thin, to having the right figure, to being muscular if you are a guy), but somehow, I had still bought into the lie that some people were better-looking than others. I had thought that it was a fact rather than a perspective. And I felt ridiculously shallow.
…
Since that day, I have been addressing the root of my fallacy, which I believe to be insecurity. I doubt that it will a short or easy process to remove the last traces of this lie, but I have dealt with it for far too long. I am more than ready to accept my identity in Christ and stop living in fear. Please pray for freedom for myself and the girls on my team.
Thanks,
Jordan
