see the mountains move.

If you have thought any of these things today:

if only I could lose a little more weight in my thighs; if I was a better student I would be more valuable; I should have run more; I need a more impressive job; my hair never falls right; maybe if I stalk myself on Facebook again, my face will change or I’ll look skinnier—I’ll become beautiful; maybe I would stand out if I was as pretty as the girls they all talked about; maybe I’d be worth more if they saw past my looks; I must be non-existent or irrelevant. 

Stop. Stop right now. 

And if you have ever thought that there will never be a day where these thoughts are absent from your mind, where they will stop racing through your head and leaving traces of destruction in their wake, listen to me.

There is hope. A real, transformative hope.

These insecurities that stem from our obscene and competitive desire for perfection are NOT a part of the baseline identity that God created you to be. You are NOT your insecurities, and they do not have to control you. I promise you that there is a ‘you’ apart from self-hatred, self-loathing, and deflating jealousy, and as difficult as it may be to believe that, it is crucial that you begin to trust that it’s true—that God designed you to be beautifully more than that. 

Looking in the mirror, I used to see someone that curdled my stomach, that made me feel like knives were being stabbed slowly into my abdomen. I often found myself believing that I was unlovable, repulsive, and ultimately a mistake within God’s otherwise stunning creation. I felt immediately inferior to every other girl when I walked into a room, just waiting for them to find me out—to see my endless flaws and weaknesses.

Having been a believer for a long time now, conviction continually flooded my soul as the Holy Spirit called me out for how ungrateful and prideful my view of self was when it was drenched in such insecurities, yet I began to become numb. I began to believe that my insecurities were a part of me—that they're something about me that would never change. My perpetual sin, per say. 

From then on, they would lie dormant at times—only bubbling to the surface in occasional comments or remarks about myself or others—yet at other times they would fully consume my life to the point of depression and apathy, of thinking that my life was not significant enough to keep around. 

This depressed, apathetic state is where I found myself in May. I was almost lifeless, hopeless, exhausted from fighting in all the wrong ways. I just kept trying to believe that I was better, different from what I thought I was. My prayers were for princess bandaids to cover my gaping stab wounds—for momentary pain relief, not for healing. I was at the end of myself, and that is when I learned to stop, to really stop. 

I was reading in Daniel 2 when the Lord changed my life forever. 

Frankly, I will never forget that passage--the significance that Nebuchadnezzar’s life holds to my own. God took Nebuchadnezzar—the prideful king of Babylon so loyal to his own agenda—and humbled him in a way that no man could have ever done. He stranded him in the wild until he developed the features of a bird, waiting with patience for him to declare that God was in fact God. When Nebuchadnezzar finally surrendered his pride and desire for control—when he submitted to the power of Lord—he was restored to his kingdom. What I extracted from this was simply that God goes to whatever extent necessary to center his children on himself, to heal them with his power and with his Son’s redeeming blood. 

God is persistent enough to change you, and even more beautifully, beyond powerful enough to change you in ways you never thought possible. 

This passage encouraged me, really pushed me down to the feet of the throne, to offer up my deeply sinful insecurities to the Lord.

Lord, they are on the altar of my life. Please take them.

And wow, I have never seen healing so powerful, so tangible. My stab wounds that have dripped blood for a decade have been sown up; I have seen a new beauty in who God designed me to be that I had never been able to see before through that shattered and clouded mirror of my prior perspective. Above all else, I have been humbled by the truth that my years of effort were unsuccessful, but God’s efforts went beyond the realm of success—they healed me and then began to shape who I have become. I promise you, you can be healed in this way, too.

There is no ten step solution, there is no serum that I can lend to you. 

Surrender, calling on the Lord in prayer knowing that he can move mountains, asking him to step in and remove the insecurity that you have always thought was a part of your identity, that is what leads to healing. That is what reminds you of how powerful the God you serve actually is. 

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” Matthew 7:7-8

Step down from your high horse, I had to. Come lay at the feet of the great healer, and let him bind up your wounds. 

Expectant prayer works. See him move mountains.