Beautiful

 August 9, 2024

Yesterday was an amazingly freeing and heart touching day for me.  God was so beautiful and so reflecting of His lovingkindness to me.  I am blessed and peaceful and feeling loved like I could not believe.

For many years I’ve carried the guilt of my past, and my present.  I’ve never realized until last night at the Neighborhood Ladies Meeting where we watched a Chondra Pierce comedy video, that a lot of what I was carrying besides the guilt and feelings of “never good enough” and unworthiness, was shame.  I see myself as shameful.  She talked about not liking what we see in the mirror, of even hating it.  And when I look at myself, with all my unbelievably dark stains of sin, and the way I still behave today….I really don’t like myself very much.  And so of course I transfer that way of looking at myself to how God Himself sees me.  

No matter that He told me years ago that I could never “out sin” His love.  That day in the car when He told me this I wept and repented.  I saw my wretchedness as bigger than Him, bigger than His love and bigger than the Cross.  He corrected me that day, convicting me of idolatry.   I’ve had trouble hanging onto this message from Him, still seeing myself as ugly in His eyes.  When I screw up, I let this truth slip from my grasp, reverting the the "I'm never good enough." refrain.  

No matter about 18 months ago when He told me through our BSF facilitator that He stopped remembering my sin, why was I still bringing it up.  This too, I have trouble hanging onto. 

Fast forward to yesterday.  One of the questions in a Bible study that I am doing was, “What are some things that might keep you from studying Scripture with others?”  Well, I actually like to study Scripture with others, but that doesn’t mean I open myself up completely, unashamedly.  I wrote as part of my answer that I am fearful of studying with others, or I should really say, fearful of sharing myself with others because if they saw the true me, the deep down, failing, and ungodlike parts of me, they would run.  They would judge and reject….just the way I myself do when I “look in the mirror.”  If they knew the things I’ve done, the unkindness that roams my heart….These are the things I hide behind the “Christian face” I put on. 

And so seeing myself that way, I assume that God, even though He loves me, does not really approve of me or see me as beautiful.  

But last night, at what was supposed to be a light hearted gathering of ladies, God reached me in the deepest way.  He even had Chondra mention the specific sin I feel most guilty about (the "big" ones, the ones I have so hard a time forgiving myself for).  That’s how I knew He was speaking to me.  She said, He sees me through eyes of mercy.  He sees me as beautiful.  He says I am His Princess.  His beloved daughter.  

She told a story of how when her own daughter was at that "awkward age," all acne faced and gangly looking, they went to a medieval times performance.  As the knights fought pretend battles, the one who was representing their section of the audience, won.  As he came to their section, riding his trusty steed, he reached up and bowed before her daughter.  He then took her by the hand, and placed her on his horse.  After parading around the arena, he brought her to a set of stairs leading up the royal “palace” area where the king sat.  The knight then walked her up the stairs and presented her to the king, who place a crown on her head and presented her to the audience.  

This is an amazing picture of Christ with me.  He picked me up after His victorious triumph over sin and death, and presented me to His Father.  The Father, instead of seeing a scarred, broken, and ragged little girl, sees HIS beautiful princess.  Me.  His eyes of mercy see me so lovingly, so longingly, so kindly.  Lord, I want to hold onto this.  Even as I drove away from my friends house last night I could feel Satan trying to steal this truth away from me.  Trying to talk me out of what I knew was meant to be a special message for me.  I was reminded of the parable Jesus told about the seed that fell on hard ground and how the birds of the air came and took away the seeds.  That’s what I felt he was trying to do.  I knew I needed to soften my heart to God AND to myself.  I was to no longer be denying myself God’s mercy and grace.  

I am so grateful that God doesn’t give up on me.  I can be so blinded by my own sin, that I forget His grace is greater still.  I forget His love is more then enough to cleanse me and cause Him to look at me with love.  He fights for me, even when I don’t fight for myself.  

Chondra sang a song called “Mercy Saw Me” that just blew me away.  

I can’t put into words the way this message and song reached me last night.  I can’t put into words the amount of gratitude, no words at all, with which I can say thank You to my Father.  I’m still digesting this and want to bury it in my heart as a seed to bear fruit that pleases my Lord, that brings Him glory, that helps others who are stuck like I was.  I know that this will take time to bring the healing my heart needs, but like the song says, God sees what I could be.  I pray that this message can mean to others what it meant and means to me.    

Last night I vowed to God, that I would not let this go.  That I would not let Satan steal it from me.  That is why I have typed this out.  And I pray in the power of the Holy Spirit, through Jesus my Savior that I hold on to this with every part of my being.  Praises to our sweet loving Father, who sees us through eyes of mercy because of Jesus the Son.