If you’re anything like me, you spend a lot of time doubting yourself. You think to yourself “oh, that person can do that, but not me, I can’t.” You focus so much on your flaws and your struggles that sometimes you even forget that you’re a whole person outside of those struggles that you face. You often live with a fear of being “found out” – that is, of people knowing the REAL you. People knowing how you really struggle, what you really deal with on the inside. You don’t want anyone else to know, and you are afraid that if they did, they would judge you. They might even question your faith, and ask you how you could be a Christian, yet still be struggling in this way…
If they’re a friend, maybe they would decide to abandon you. Maybe they would learn how you really struggle and decide that you’re too broken to be their friend. Maybe people you go to church with, maybe they would judge you. Maybe they would call you a hypocrite, because how can you be so absolutely incapable of living a life completely free of insecurity and self-doubt when you are a Christian? Don’t you know your identify in Christ? Don’t you KNOW what the scripture says about you? Don’t you realize that you are a child of God? So how in the world can you still be struggling in this way?
Maybe they would tell you your worthless. Maybe they would subconsciously lead you to believe the lie from the enemy that you are defined by your struggles. Maybe they would criticize you even more than you already criticize yourself. Maybe they would even say that they despise you because of your struggles. Maybe they would tell you to cover them up really good because who would want to see someone in such a broken, vulnerable place? Who would want to see the REAL, broken, imperfect you? Is there anyone who could see this version of you and still love you for it?
Jesus Christ. That’s who. That’s who can, does, and always will love you – not just the you that you want everyone else to see, but the REAL you. The broken you. The you that you have spent so much of your life trying to hide. The you that is afraid of being found out. Yeah, he loves THAT you. He made you exactly the way that that he wanted you to be. And those things that you struggle with that you wish so badly you didn’t? God can work in the midst of them. He can use those struggles to showcase HIS glory and HIS work in your life. Our struggles are a constant reminder to us that we are weak and incapable creatures on our own, and that we NEED the Holy Spirit in our lives to make us whole and complete. We need the Holy Spirit at work in us to make us a reflection of Christ, and our struggles remind us that nothing good we will ever do comes from our own strength, it is ALWAYS by the grace of God and through the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives. May our struggles and our weaknesses be testimonies that reveal the glory of Christ at work within us.
Oh, and anyone who actually does criticize you in the ways mentioned above (I hope and pray that that never actually happens to any of us, but unfortunately, it does ENTIRELY too often)…
Those people are not worth your time. Those people are not loving you like Christ loves you, and my dearest friends, their opinions of you do not matter. The idea that we have to be perfect all the time and free of struggles is just a LIE that the enemy wants us to believe, because if he can get us to believe that we ‘shouldn’t’ struggle, he can get us to be SILENT about our struggles, live in our shame, and never heal from our deepest wounds, hurts, and insecurities.
I say this with all the love in the world that my human heart possibly can: SPEAK. Share your struggles with people you love and trust, and who you know truly care about you. (And, if in the past you have opened up to someone who you thought you could trust and they let you down, I am so, SO incredibly sorry that you experienced that, but I also know that as hard as it may be, you HAVE to step out in faith and share with someone again. It is for the sake of your own healing and spiritual well-being. I know it’s hard, but I have faith in you. You can absolutely gain courage to share again through the power of the Holy Spirit inside of you, just ASK Him to give you that courage. He is so faithful.) There is healing in community, friends, and there ARE still amazing Jesus-loving people out there who will love you for you and not judge you for your struggles. I know this because I would not be where I am today without the solid, spirit-filled individuals who spent time pouring truth into my life when I revealed my deepest hurts to them and got honest about my shame. I let them see the real me, and they loved me for it. What a true reflection of Christ’s love for us, and of the community he created us for.
Let people see the real you. Those who will leave you for it, they don’t matter. The people who matter, they will stay. They will love you even more for your vulnerability. They will even want to grow closer to you because of it, and maybe they will even open up and share their struggles with you, too. Let us bear one another’s burdens, and lead each other to the cross. Let us honor God in anything and everything that we do. Let us show our REAL selves, unafraid, and unashamed.
Galatians 6:2: “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ”, (ESV).
2 Corinthians 12:7b-10: “Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.’ So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong”, (NRSV).
Leah's blog 