Walls.

So, if you know me or have ever seen me, it’s pretty obvious I’m a klutz. I trip over my feet on flat surfaces; I miss steps going down AND up the stairs on occasion. But even worse, I run into walls, a lot. It’s not something I purposely do but it’s something that I just happen to either run into a wall full on or I just hit it with my arm. I don’t know if it’s my depth perception that just is not good or if I just fail at life. Either way, walls and I are not really friends when I’m walking. The same goes for spiritual walls. Through my walk with Christ so far, I’ve had to face some of my own personal walls: fear, anger, selfishness, pride, etc. There is one wall in particular that I’ve kept pretty high up that actually keeps something out: self-love. When talking about self-love, a natural response to that term would be to think that self-love is prideful and narcissistic but to me, self-love was non-existent and I didn’t even realize it!!! Imagine hating absolutely everything about you so much that you don’t even realize you hate yourself because you’re caught up on other people’s problems, feelings, and lives. I’m not saying that I’m a gossip queen and lived to know other people’s business, but rather I always have put everyone before myself. Don’t take this the wrong way; there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with putting people before you. Actually, I encourage it! But the reason I was putting everyone before me is what was wrong. I hated myself so much physically, spiritually, mentally, and emotionally that I would do just about anything to get recognition, praise, and better yet: love. I looked to my family, my friends, guys, my job, and my voice to make me loved, to make me feel loved. I was wrong! I go to this amazing church, Celebration Christian Church, in Marion. A few weeks ago our pastor, Matt Brent, did a sermon by starting off with the song “Just the way you are” by Bruno Mars. I honestly had no idea where his sermon was going to go that day, but I was instantly captured by the song and was drawn into the sermon from the start. After he finished singing the song, he commented on how women love that song (and we do) but how we don’t believe a word of it (which I know I didn’t). I could go on and on about the sermon, but I still have a lot to write so just check it out under “believe” in the podcasts section of celebration247.com  The next day, a close friend of mine sat down and talked to me about what God was speaking to him about me and my worth. With our talk, God revealed to me that I had no self-love what so ever. I didn’t care about myself at all and it was slowly killing me inside. Even though I was happy, I didn’t love myself but God made me worthy! God, the creator of this universe seven days, the one who saved his people from slavery, and the one who sent his one and ONLY son to live a sinless life to die for us, made ME worthy. I realized a few weeks ago, that absolutely everything I hated about myself, God loves! His love and grace for me extends from east to west and NO ONE can stop that! Self-love is not bad at all when it’s in terms of realizing we are something incredible to God. An almighty father loves us! He made us worthy and as Christians, we need to love ourselves because God calls us to love how He loves. And if we don’t love ourselves, aren’t we thinking ourselves higher than God since He calls us to love like He loves? We are called to love ourselves just as much as we are our brothers and sisters. We are to put our brothers and sisters before us, but we are supposed to love ourselves as who God made us is my point. The wall that I had up for so long that kept that love away is breaking down. Praise God!

Be transformed!

Romans 12:2 says "Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect." I named my blog Romans 12:2 for a simple reason: I want to be transformed! I hope and pray that God will transform my speech, thoughts, heart, and life and I can't wait to write about it here :)