Dear high school Leah,
I wish I could’ve told you how much all of those things you’re worrying about right now will not matter to you at all in a few years.
I wish I could show you now how much you are growing in your relationship with God and blossoming into the woman He has called you to be.
I really wish I could tell you that one day, you will recognize that your beauty and your self-worth are not encompassed in your weight. I wish I could tell you that the number on the scale truly just is, and always will be, nothing but a number. That number cannot measure your character, beauty, talent, strength, or the love that is within your heart. I know you may not see it now, Leah, but one day, one day you will understand. One day you will not be living in bondage to a number, and you will truly be walking in step with the Holy Spirit fulfilling the calling on your life and seeing that this “beauty” you have been chasing so badly, it lies within you. It lies within the person you are becoming, the person God is calling you to be.
I wish I could tell you that it’s okay to feel different. It’s okay that you feel like you don’t “fit in” with your high school friends. They aren’t chasing after God like you. Absolutely nothing against them, but recognize that when you chase after God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength; you might start to look different than the world – and that’s okay. It’s okay that you don’t fit in with people who are not wholeheartedly pursuing the Lord, and ONE day Leah – one day you will find friends who are. One day, you will have friends who are running after God just as fast as you are. One day you will understand the true meaning of friendship, and you may wonder how you lived so long without these friends, but you will thank GOD for putting them in your life when He did.
One day you will grow up. You will see things differently than your high school self did. You will start to realize the people and the things in life that have true and lasting importance to you. Your relationship with God, those friends who are pursuing God with you, the ministry you get to do with teenagers, working with a staff who truly feels like family, pursuing the degree in seminary that God has called you to get, your family who loves you so dearly, visiting your grandparents as often as humanly possible because you just don’t know how long they will be around- those, those are the things that truly matter, and one day, one day you will finally see it. You will see how much God has blessed you, and your eyes will look to different things than your younger self did. Your eyes will look more to Godly things, and less to the things of this world.
1 Peter 3:3-4: “Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight”, (NIV).
Psalm 46:4-5: “There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day”, (NIV). (Italics added)
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