February 28, 2011

Striving for Wholeness

If I asked you to define the role of women based on the messages you receive from the media, your family, and/or your church, what would you say? Would you use words like: soccer mom, proper, nag, slave, caretaker, busy, high achiever, lover?

Most of those words are negative, or at least assumed to be negative. You see, our world and unfortunately even some of our churches capitalize on a woman’s default emotion: shame. A woman can be shamed into almost anything. Think about that for a second…we are awesome at making excuses for whatever we couldn’t do and/or rearranging our schedules to almost our breaking points to make sure we can. Shame.

I have read story after story of women who were too afraid to say no, to whomever or whatever, and so have sacrificed their families, their jobs, their friendships, and even themselves to be “The Proverbs 31 Woman”. What is really the motivation behind such a huge pursuit? We want to be accepted. Acceptance…the opposite of shame. Unfortunatley, your methods to procure acceptance may couple with shame, negating the acceptance. You are right back where you started: shame.

Women are constantly striving. Striving to lose weight, dress better, save money, interact more, work less, love husband, protect kids, look good, improve house, stay composed…stay composed? Yeah right! We automatically feel as though we aren’t good enough. That was Eve’s problem in the Garden…it wasn’t good enough that she had the perfect body, awesome husband, beautiful home, best job. Nope…she wanted to be like God. But before we are too hard on Eve, you must remember…she was deceived by the Father of all Lies, Satan. He mingled truth and deception and got her. He targeted her Achilles heel: shame. If she had the same knowledge and understanding as God, wouldn’t she be better able to protect herself from ever feeling ashamed? She thought so. So she took the bait. So have you…and now you are paying for it.

At some point in our lives, we experienced one of the following:
-          Unmet needs.
-          Unhealed hurts.
-          Unresolved issues.

The result: We believed a lie about ourselves…and we have been paying for it ever since. How do I know? Every woman is looking for love, acceptance, worth, security. If you aren’t sure which one, think through your greatest fears, or to simplify, whatever makes you most anxious. Now, get to the bottom of the fear, anxiety…what are you really trying to avoid? You want to know why women seem to be control freaks and/or nags? We are attempting to avoid whatever it is that we feel will steal our love, acceptance, worth and security. One of those unmet, unhealed, or unresolved circumstances lied to us and told us we are not okay in and of ourselves. Let that sink in for a minute.

We hurt so we self-medicate. We turn to sex to feel loved and wanted…only to find out, we are neither to that man…or sadly, that woman. We try to perform so that we are owed certain rights and/or to avoid never measuring up…only to realize that we are made of the same stuff as those “sinners”. We take pills to relieve the anxiety and to find rest. We get angry to protect our children. We nag to keep our husbands. We have our hair died, nails done, skin tanned and buy the perfect clothes so we have an “in” with our husbands, friends, co-workers. We do whatever it takes and we are left disillusioned.

Genesis 1:27 says that God created man…and woman. Both. Specifically us.

You have dignity because you were created after God’s image. However, we live so undignified when we try to find our love, acceptance, worth, security elsewhere. We run frantic, act paranoid, get angry, live manipulatively, all because we cannot accept ourselves because at some point we were fed the lie that we were unacceptable.

Now we can’t even accept God’s love.

We need to understand how God created us so we know exactly how we are wired and how He will fill us, heal us, and meet our needs.

We were designed with three outstanding desires:
-          We want to be romanced.
-          We want to share in an adventure.
-          We want to unveil our beauty.

1 Peter 3 gives the Biblical breakdown of these desires. God wants to romance us. Over and over in Scripture, we read that He holds our hands, protects us, draws us to Himself, seeks us out, and ultimately, died for us. He is our protector, defender, lover, friend. He wants to include us in His adventure; He has a purpose for each of us. He has instilled in you a dream that He created you to pursue…with Him! Don’t ever think God wants to give you less than what you dream…His plan is to give you a future and a hope. Go for it!

God has made you to reflect His awesome beauty and creativity. Your beauty was never designed to be the source of your security…but it was given to you to point back to God, the awesome Creator. You are beautiful…read that again if you need to. You ARE beautiful. However, how you feel about yourself internally is always reflected in your external appearance. Some women take too much care of themselves and others not enough…for the same reason: insecurity. Those that are secure in their God’s love and their husband’s/friend’s, are conscientious but not obsessed with their outward appearance. Interesting.

Here is your challenge…

Get alone with God. Ask Him to reveal the lies that you have believed about yourself. This is so hard to do and be sure to be alone and have Kleenex. You will cry. You will be surprised to discover that you have been deceived for probably years…and possibly by something that the world would deem as “not that big of a deal”. But oh, it is!

After you have discovered the lie, own it. Admit that you have believed it and have allowed it to define you…for too long.

Then, get into the Word. You have to replace the lie with Truth. You have to purpose to listen to only the Truth…not feelings. If you don’t have a good handle on Scripture, no worries. Log onto www.Biblegateway.com and plug a word into the search bar. If you believe you are unlovable, put “love” in the search. If you believe you are ugly, put “beauty” in there. You get the idea. Print out some of the verses and put them everywhere:  your car, bathroom, desk, kitchen. Read them. Pray over them. And then hang on…God is going to heal you!!!

Adapted from Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge

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