It is a great feeling to empty out my life and emotions in this blog. It is rather difficult as well. I realize that I've held in more shame than I thought I had. I know that once I gave my life to Christ that I was forgiven. I realize God had forgiven me but I hadn't really forgiven myself. I could forgive others way more than I could myself.
People that carry shame are easily spotted. I can say that because I was one of those people. I would walk with my head down, never making eye contact. What if someone could look in my eyes and see the disgusting things I had done? I really felt strongly in that area when I first started going to church. Here are all these people that live their lives for God. They had it all together. What would they think of someone like me? In fact I didn't even want a name tag because then I could no longer stay anonymous. If people would ask my name, I would look down or away and just give them my first name. Even once I started to build relationships, I would keep people at arm's distance because I was just sure once they found out my past, I would be shunned. I didn't deserve to be among the people that had it all together and surely they would judge me.
Now that I've been at the same church for quite some time, I realize that we are all a group of dysfunctional people. If someone walks around saying they have it all together, they are just hiding the truth. I don't care if you were raised in the "perfect" family - life happens. No one is perfect! Even if we would like to believe we need to be. I've always felt like I needed to be perfect in many ways but the most important being about my body. In order to achieve the best body possible, I would starve myself or exercise continually. I had associated who I was with how my body looked. It started from a young age. People wouldn't notice anything about my personality or what was on the inside but the outward appearance. It was either about my body or eyes. My dad's friends would come over and I would walk outside in my swimming suit to get in our pool and they would make crude comments about my body. So I associated attention with how I looked on the outside. Even when I worked in Denver several years back, the men in my office made my login name on the computer "legs". That's all they saw when they looked at me even when I was their office manager. So now I'm getting older and let's face it, your body droops more than it did when you were younger. And God is taking this maturing season in my life to show me how true beauty is what's on the inside. And when your body starts to fail you, it's a perfect learning opportunity. It's not like I have a choice unless I want plastic surgery. And I've spent way too much of my life numbing out and being fake that I don't want any part of it anymore which includes parts of my body.
So the shame needs to take a long vacation to never return. I realized this morning that I take very hot showers. In fact the water is almost scalding hot. I always thought it was because I was cold all the time. I've take these kinds of hot showers for as long as I can remember. And God showed me this morning that it has to do with the shame that I have held inside. It's almost like I need to purify my body. That maybe if I get the water hot enough, it will get rid of all the residue of my past life. The ugliness will be washed away.
Shame is defined as "a painful emotion caused by consciousness of guilt or shortcoming." And the definition of shortcoming is "an imperfection or lack that detracts from the whole". We feel like we need to be perfect or make ourselves whole so that God and other people will love us. But Jesus is the one that makes us whole. We can try to make our bodies, faces, minds and children perfect but we are of the flesh. We will mess up and I've done that my fair share but it's time to know that I am forgiven. I am a child of God and I am here to help others realize the same. We are a society of hurting people. I want to be able to look into their eyes and see the hurt and for them to know that I'm here. I will not judge them. I want to show them the same God that brought me to where I am today. I'm not anyone special or different, I've just walked the same long journey and I'm getting free! Thank you God!
"Then Jesus turned to the Jews who had claimed to believe in him. "If you stick with this, living out what I tell you, you are my disciples for sure. Then you will experience for yourselves the truth, and the truth will free you." John 8:31-32 (The Message)
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