By Dr. DAN ERICKSON
When you got up this morning and looked in the mirror what did you see? What did you feel?
Do you know that what you see plus what you feel will always drive what you do with your life? What you see and feel will determine your choices, behavior, potential and destiny.
Do you see yourself as God’s creation, made in his image? Or do you see yourself through the grid of your past, pain, sin or addiction? Are you condemned, helpless and hopeless?
What do grids do? They filter out particles and impurities that do not belong. If you use the grid of truth, then you filter out lies about yourself and God. But if you use the grid of lies, you filter out God’s truth instead. If you have a relationship with Jesus Christ, then God sees you through the grid of Christ. He sees you as perfect and complete in him. When your filter is God’s word as revealed in the Bible, then it can set you free.
When you see how your life is going, how do you feel?
Do you feel hope or despair? Peace or pieces? Joy or sadness? Pain or potential? Feelings are neither right nor wrong in and of themselves. It is the decisions we make based on these feelings that matter.
In the Epistle to the Romans, chapter 8, I find great encouragement every time I feel guilty, ugly or condemned. It says, “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1) How? “For the law of the Spirit of life has set you (us) free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).
How God sees and feels about us is not conditional upon our behavior, but upon Christ paying the redemptive price for us on the cross. It does not matter how ugly our lives may have become, because God still loves and accepts us as we are in Christ. God accepts as we are, but loves us to much to leave us the way we are.
This reminds me of the song “God Loves Ugly,” recently popularized by Jordin Sparks:
You said that I wasn't pretty
So I just believed you
And you said that I wasn't special
So I lived that way
With critical gazes and brutal amazement
And how my reflection could be so imperfect
With all of my blemishes, how could somebody want me?
I tried to clean up the outside
All shiny and new
Worked over time to thin up and look right
But inside I knew
That deep in the bottom were secrets I thought I could try to ignore
Old ghosts in my corridors
Never get tired of haunting the past that's in me
Help me believe why you love me
When I know you see
You see everything
Help me believe why you love me
When I know you see
Inside and you still say I'm beautiful
You're telling me I'm beautiful
Your screaming out I'm so beautiful
And I'm finding out I'm beautiful
You're making me so beautiful
And I can see I'm beautiful
Cause you love me
After each verse the chorus reminds us:
But God loves ugly
He doesn't see the way I see
Oh God takes ugly
And turns it into to something that is beautiful
Apparently I'm beautiful
Cause you love me
When you read these lyrics, what do you see in the words about yourself and how does it make you feel? Try to seeing and feeling what God sees and feels, then imagine the possibilities!
