Throughout my time of fundraising and preparing for the race, I was pretty open to what the Lord wanted to teach me. I was even open to changing in areas that I knew would be uncomfortable; I leaned in and said yes. But did you know that there was one area that I didn’t? I had a section of my heart untouched, impenetrable. I wouldn’t go there and neither would the Lord.
It’s amazing the things that you think you can avoid even after you’ve surrendered your life to Christ. You begin almost bargaining with him. ‘Sure God, I will follow you with all my heart and not look back. But oh wait, we just won’t touch this area here. But don’t worry, I’ll give you the rest of what I have.’
That’s not exactly how that works. It’s one of those all or nothing deals. So when it came time to address this issue, I was terrified. I reminded God that we had a deal, and that this didn’t even need to be dealt with. Unfortunately for me at the time, none of that was going to fly.
Words hold a lot of weight in our world. When I was growing up, I was surrounded by them. Words of encouragement, happiness, fear, anger, joy. Words that were spoken over me began to mold who I thought I was.
I was told I wasn’t smart enough.
My head was always in the clouds.
I couldn’t focus.
I wasn’t pretty enough.
I was too scrawny.
I would never measure up to this person or that person.
I’m too sensitive/moody.
I’m not enough.
We can have the most encouraging people surrounding us (which I did) and still, those ugly, negative words will seep through and wrap around the image we have of ourselves.
This carried on into my teen and adult life, I chose relationships that weren’t good, education and career, you name it. I made choices based on ‘I’m not good enough.’
Fast forward to the world race. The Lord was teaching me things left and right, and finally he brought this area of my life to the light. I think sometimes you can live a certain way for so long you don’t realize you are doing it anymore, and to be honest I hadn’t even given it thought in a long time, but there it was, still just as strong and awful in all it’s influence.
Enough.
Because I am God, your personal God,
The Holy of Israel, your Savior.
I paid a huge price for you:
all of Egypt, with rich Cush and Seba thrown in!
That’s how much you mean to me!
That’s how much I love you!
I’d sell off the whole world to get you back,
trade the creation just for you.
Isaiah 43:1-4 MSG
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew[a] you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.
Jeremiah 1:5 NIV
ENOUGH.
He told me to speak of my fear to a group I do life with, and so I did. As painful as it was to talk about, and as impossible as it seemed to deal with, He brought it to the light. Through time, prayer, community, and truth he has brought so much healing into my life. The change has been revolutionary to the way I live and approach choices. There is a freedom, and peace where there used to be fear and shame.
Identity:
the condition of being oneself or itself, and not another.
I know who I am. I am created for a purpose, exactly how it was meant to be. I won’t worry about the world’s standards, I know to whom I belong. And that is all that matters.
When that fear tries to come to the surface again, I have a God who is MIGHTY to turn to. I will take captive of those thoughts and replace them with truth. I don’t live in that junk anymore. Those things about myself that I used to see as negative, now I see through my fathers eyes. I see the strength and the good in it.
You know what is one of the greatest joys I have now? I get to SHARE this. I want to be able to bring others who have gone through and are going through the same fears of not measuring up. There is healing friends. There is hope. You are not alone.
ENOUGH.
