The CV Chronicles: True Beauty

I’ll be honest. I really struggle with negative feelings about my physical apperance. If you could crawl in my head and walk around inside my brain you would see phrases like “fat chick” “you’re so ugly”, “You’ll never get married because you’re ugly”, “ You are such a loser cause you can’t loose weight”, “ You would be liked more if you were prettier” seared across the walls.  For so long I have carried these thoughts around like chains around my ankles. They’ve been there so long I had ceased to hear the clinking metal and smell the rotting flesh.  These shackles have held me down for so long, I never thought things could be any different.

Yesterday, I got hard core rebuked by my pastor for calling myself ugly. He told me “oh, so Psalm 139 isn’t true for you sister? Sarah, how do you expect to be able to counsel teenage girls who all think they are ugly if you talk like that?” He was so right, I was so ashamed of myself. I’ve always known that the way I think was wrong, but I’ve never really known what to do about it. The Lord is so sovereign and He has chosen that today would be the day that I would leave behind these fetters behind me.  

I was walking with one of my girls today and she said “Sarah, a lot of girls like to be tan, and they call me ugly because I’m pale”  I was thinking 'THIS IS SO WRONG'. All of the girls in my cabin wear so much makeup. They are so young! None of them are even in high school. Yet, they are already enslaved to the makeup industry. They have been sold an impossible standard.

So I told her this “Listen, there comes a time in every woman’s life that she must decide who she is going to listen to about her appearance, the World or the Bible. Never forget, the world always lies, and no matter how hard you try, you will never reach it's standard of perfection. And not only that, but you will spend the rest of you life attempting to maintain a body that is decaying. However, if you choose to listen to the Bible you will gain the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit that is very precious in the sight of God.” As I said this to her, I realized I really should be preaching to myself. 

The truth is I haven’t been the best example. I performed during chapel in Monday and I spent 

the time before it obsessing about my appearance in the cabin.  I was such a bad example.

 

Never again. Never again will I determine my worth by my assessment of my physical appearance. Never again will I be such a terrible example to women younger than me. Never again will I allow myself to think these destructive thoughts. Never again will I dishonor the Lord in this way. NEVER AGAIN.

So tonight for part of our devotions I’m going to bring out the cabin trash can, I’m going to take my makeup box and I’m going to throw it in the trash. No more of that. My appearance has become an idol and like Samuel I'm going to "hack him to pieces before the Lord". 

Amen and Amen