It’s so easy to present a finished blog and allow you to believe it’s the full story. I can edit and rewrite and omit and manipulate the content to reveal whatever angle looks the most shiny.
Doing that is like saying, “Here you go: This is a neatly-wrapped lesson I learned in God’s classroom this week. Everything’s fine now. I’m fine now.”
The concept of authenticity has been a theme lately, and I feel it’s important to let you in on what my current situation actually looks like. This post would have looked quite different had I shared the version of me I wanted you to see. It would have looked like less brokenness and more false perfection.
It’s ironic that God recently told me to do a 40-day makeup fast leading into Easter. Maybe He was telling me to take off the pretty face to teach me about more than my aesthetic. Maybe He wants me to remove the concealers of my heart and let you see its blemishes for what they are.
I wasn’t excited to let go of my eyebrow products and I’m not excited about letting go of my spiritual frills either. It’s scary to be vulnerable and to admit the things that make me feel weak.
I’m so tempted to put on a strong face and tell you I’m not hurting, but that isn’t the whole truth. It’s the enhanced, bow-tied-around-it version of things. It’s not authentic.
So here goes nothing, or everything if you’re me. I’m walking through one of my biggest fears right now, and it’s freaking hard.
Let me explain:
For much of my life I believed I was unlovable.
I used to feel absolutely, crushingly unlovable by any person in this world. People didn’t meet my expectations, and I allowed their shortcomings to control how much worth I believed I had. Forget giving them grace because I was the victim and they were wrong, or at least that’s what my hurting heart reflected at the time.
My fear of rejection was crippling me underneath the independent, careless, rebellious mask I put on for most of my life. Behind that wall, I was a fragile little girl who was hurting more than she knew how to express.
In the inner healing and transformation I’ve journeyed through since meeting Jesus, I have learned that maybe my idea of what it meant to be loved was a bit skewed.
Long story short, I now know I am lovable after all. I know I am loved by people in my life, but even better, I’m loved by the Lord. That fact alone is enough to make me secure. I’ve accepted this deep in my heart and it’s changed my entire outlook on life. This revelation has led to the improvement of nearly every relationship I have. God’s promise and follow-through to love me has confirmed who I am is a person worthy of love.
What I believe I’m worth is not dependent on other people’s ability to love me today. Thank God.
So why am I sharing this? What’s my point?
Recently it came out that someone I live in community with is having a difficult time loving me.
I’ve seen this person walk through maybe one of the hardest seasons of their life thus far, and I’ve tried with all of me to love them in the brokenness. Maybe I don’t fully understand what they’re going through. I definitely don’t have the power to fix it, but what I can do is show them kindness and love. I’ve chosen to love because that’s what God does for me. He chooses to love me in my brokenness and fear and sin.
It’s not easy, and truthfully, my flesh wants to abandon my soul’s efforts. There are whispers in my head saying I shouldn’t fight to love someone who seems to hate me. It would be too easy to give up on this person because it seems like they’ve given up on me. It would be easy to throw up my hands in frustration and say “screw it.” It would be easy, but easy is not what God is asking of me.
In living in constant community with someone who admittedly doesn’t love me, I’ve had to look at the state of my heart and ask myself how I’m going to let that affect me.
Am I going to let someone else’s issues dictate who I believe I am? Am I going to change every part about myself to make this person love me more? Am I going to run to the hills in avoidance of the hard conversations that come when there’s a lapse in love?
I surely don’t want to. I don’t want to let circumstances have that power over me. I want to walk in the freedom God has given me and fight to love my enemies just as He did.
Jesus said, “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.”
I always thought Jesus’ command was a little strong-worded for the things I’ve walked through in my life. I don’t consider people in my life “enemies” and I don’t feel particularly “persecuted.” Those things are supposed to be for martyrs, not me.
But here’s the thing: Jesus, in His humble, loving stance, had many enemies and He was persecuted unto death. It would make sense that I would experience the same thing in my life, even if it comes in a different flavor.
No matter what Jesus went through – humiliation, mocking, backstabbing, beatings, a gruesome death – He didn’t let circumstances change His decision to love. Even when people hated Him to the point of hanging Him on a cross, He chose to love them by dying FOR them. He is the ultimate example of what it is to love an enemy.
I wouldn’t claim this situation to be anywhere close to Jesus’, but it is showing me what it truly means to follow Jesus when the going gets tough.
It would be a lie to say I’m not tempted to follow the pattern of this world and forsake loving people who hurt me. The hard thing to do is rise above and give without expectations of getting anything in return.
There’s a saying that goes “Hurt people hurt people.” I don’t want to go back to hurting people because they’ve hurt me. I want to follow in the way of Jesus. At the same time, it’s absolutely terrifying and exhausting to open myself up to the rejection that’s not just in my head anymore, but it’s become reality.
This is where I must decide if I really believe that I am loved unconditionally by God. I must because what I believe influences my thoughts and my thoughts influence my actions. If I truly believe I’m lovable, then I will act as so. I will pour out the same unconditional love to the people in front of me.
If I haven’t already made the point: This is so much easier said than done. Since this all came to light, I have been fighting like hell to give up any impurities in my heart. It’s been a struggle to constantly look inward and admit where I’ve failed, but I have to if I want to grow in love. If I want to be Jesus to people, I have to patiently endure the pushback, the rejection, the hurt. I have to do the things I don’t necessarily want to do.
I have to trust that my obedience will lead to new levels of closeness with my God. If behind the fight for harmony lies a deeper level of intimacy with Jesus, every hard conversation is more than worth it. Every single thing I do that makes me more like Him is worth it.
I see God’s hand in all of this. In the most challenging moments, when I make the seemingly impossible choice to love someone who doesn’t love me, it hits me that I’m actually closer to God than ever before. It’s those moments that deepen our relationship and make me more like Him.
This morning it occurred to me that I’m actually grateful for this particular trial. It’s pushing me right into the Lord’s arms, which is the best gift I could ask for.
I’ve cried out to God and asked Him to take away the pain this has caused me, but I know God is more concerned with making me more like Him than easing my circumstances.
He’s not going to remove me from this situation, switch my team, or take me out of this leadership role just so I can walk an easier path. He loves me too much to let me get out of this without learning something.
His will is to draw us near, no matter if we are in the highest hills or the lowest valleys. I’m thankful to have a God who fights so hard for me today.
Here’s to choosing unconditional love. It leads me to consider how beautiful this world be if each of us made that always-difficult choice.
