One of my favorite movies growing up was Annie. My friends
and I loved to play orphans dressed in rags and forced to do labor intensive
chores. Whoever could come up with the most pathetic, down trodden story won
(at least that’s what my competitive 8 y/o mind thought.) The game would always
end with our adoption and a transformation from rags to riches. My mom saved
some of her junior high and high school dance dresses, old high heels, and our
dance and Halloween costumes. I loved to rifle through the dress-up bin to put
together a new outfit, complete with jewelry and make-up, so I could make the
transformation to beautiful complete.
Feeling
beautiful is not something that happens often for me. I’ve never felt that my
outward appearance has been one of my strengths. I’ve gotten compliments on my
appearance, but I accepted those compliments as circumstantial rather than a
reflection of who I was. My skin has never been perfect and breakouts are not
something I’ve grown out of like I thought. My nose has been broken 3 times and
more prominent than I would sometimes like. Then there are body issues that
stem from years of comparing myself to other, more toned athletes that I
competed with and against throughout my soccer career. No matter how fit I was,
there were always flaws I was sure everyone else focused on just as much as I
did. These insecurities were never something I wanted to talk about because I
didn’t want people to think I was fishing for compliments or shallow for
focusing on my outward appearance. Most days, I kept silent and tried to focus
on the other things I had going for me. The problem was that those unspoken
insecurities transformed into lies I started to contemplate. Then I was then
afraid to talk about the lies because what if they were actually true? The lies
were particularly potent when I was most vulnerable during my college years.
They included things like: nobody wants to be friends with you because of the
way you look; you’ll never get playing time if you aren’t shaped like that person;
and how do you expect to get a boyfriend with skin like that? I pretended to
myself and to God that I wasn’t affected by these lies, I was secure enough in
other areas of my life that what I looked like didn’t matter to me.
I
did my best to ignore the lies, pushing them beneath the surface instead of
actually dealing with them. This technique worked for a little while after I
graduated college and once I had success in other areas of my life. I was able
to focus on those lies less, but they’ve always been teeming below the
surface. Recently, God has been
encouraging me to examine those lies and face them head on, seeing them for
what they truly are, and eliminating them in exchange for the truth.
Lie
detection device number one was a song that came on the radio. I have anywhere
from a 30-60 minute commute each day depending on traffic so I have a lot of
time to think about random things, pray or sing along to the radio. On one day
in particular, a lie had crept its way up to the forefront of my random
thoughts. As I was getting ready to ignore it like I usually do the song
playing on the radio piqued my attention.
“There
could never be a more beautiful you.
Don’t
buy the lies, disguises and hoops they make you jump through.
You
were made to fill a purpose, that only you can do,
So
there can never be a more beautiful you.”
It
was a great song written by Johnny Diaz, and if you’ve never heard it I
recommend looking it up: More Beautiful You. The song was the first echo God
laid on my heart to initiate a thought transformation. The second lie detector
came through the same radio station on a day similar to the one described
above. A woman was talking about how our physical “imperfections” are what make
us relatable to each other. We all see them as the things we would most want to
change, but God sees them as a beautiful way to make us approachable to the
people around us who don’t know about his love. If we were the picture of
perfection, we would likely be too intimidating and miss out on relationships
and opportunities to show others love. He changed my perspective of my physical
imperfections and showed me that I was intentionally created with them for His
glory.
The
last lie God encouraged me to let go of didn’t happen the way I thought it
would. As a single woman of 27 I’ve always considered myself a pretty good
catch for any Christian man (I really hope that doesn’t sound conceited.) I do
my best to seek after Christ in everything I do, I have wide variety of
interests, I enjoy watching and playing sports, I’m a good listener, and I try
to put other’s needs above my own. With all of these things going for me, I had
a hard time understanding why I’ve been single for so long. The lie that I
tried to ignore most but was probably most afraid of was that it was because I
was physically unattractive. I expected God to squash this lie by bringing the
man of my dreams into the picture so he could tell me everyday how beautiful I
am and we would live happily ever after. God chose a different way. I’ve been
reading a book by Margaret Feinberg called The
Sacred Echo. She writes about how God doesn’t just tell us something
once and we are done, we either learn the lesson or we don’t, but instead He
echoes important lessons over and over until it begins to sink in. One echo God
has continually laid on my heart whenever we discuss the romance part of my
life is wait. Should I pursue this person even if he doesn’t appear interested?
God echoes wait. Should I give on-line dating a try? God echoes wait. Should I
go to this speed-dating event to try and put myself out there? God echoes wait.
The echo takes a variety of forms from Bible verses to fictional stories to
conversations with close friends. Sometimes I am patient and graciously accept
the answer and sometimes I get frustrated and cry or yell at God for such a
silly answer. There is a chapter in this book entitled How Long? It talks about
waiting and how we (the human race) are all waiting for something: graduation,
marriage, a job, a house, retirement, etc. But we aren’t the only ones. God and
all of creation are also waiting for the world to be reconciled to Him. The
book puts it so much more eloquently than I just did and the message I gleaned
helped to change my perspective on waiting in my dating life. I learned that He
is trying to teach me how to wait expectantly because it will make what I am
waiting for that much better while at the same time increasing my trust and
faith in Him.
Once
the lies were exposed, examined, and transformed to truth, God allowed me to
see myself as He sees me. I am made to fill a purpose that only I can fulfill,
my imperfections show his strength and love to those around me, and I am
waiting not because I am unattractive, but because He wants to draw me into
closer relationship with Himself. I feel so blessed to know that God cared
enough about me to clear up the lies I thought I had under control so the truth
could set me free. I am no longer an orphan in ugly rags, but a daughter of the
King, clothed in beauty and grace.
