On beauty

This is a blog post dated June 26th, 2011, written by Sarah Bessey.  It is a note to her two daughters, on the truth about beauty, and the lies the world tells us.  It was SUCH an inspiration to me.  We are not just living for ourselves, but for those who look up to us!  May we be women who set a good example for those who follow!






Dear Anne and Evelynn:

Here are the lies, my dears:

You are only as good as you look.
You are only lovable if you have a rock hard body.
You can conquer your feelings of inadequacy by being skinny.
Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.
Everyone judges you by how you look and talks about you behind your back.
Beautiful is defined by your culture (and so it is beautiful to be frightfully skinny with bolted-on boobs and an identi-kit face).
You are not worthy of love if you are not beautiful.

I'm raising you in a world that thinks you're only as good as you look. And you're being raised by a woman who is still overcoming these lies herself.

The other day, I did an exercise video at home. You were with me, Annie, while the two littles slept and we leaped and kicked our way through jumping-jacks together. "Oh, Mum!" you glowed, "Even your tummy is having fun! Look at it jumping around!" and for a moment, oh, it stung. I just gave birth to Evelynn two months ago and so yes, my tummy is "jumping around" when I jump around and part of me wanted to sit down and cry for the sudden cacophony of worthlessness and shame that rose up but then you were there. You were there, looking up at me, having fun exercising and I thought, no. No, I will not cry about how I look in front of you. Instead I told you that this was fantastic and yes, my tummy was having a marvellous time. When you asked me why we were exercising, I had to lock my lips tight against the "to lose weight because I'm fat because I just had a baby" that threatened to spill out and instead spoke of having fun exercising for energy and playing together to be healthy and strong and hey, later, did you want to go bike riding?

I am looking for the small ways to spare you just a few battles of body-image that seems to strangle and entangle so many of us in the war against women. Like the girls that post their supper every night on Facebook for "accountability" and the ones that over-exercise to punish their own bodies. The ones that starve themselves and so carve their own flesh with the word "Forgotten" and "Invisible." Like the ones that are apologetic to their husbands because they have a body marked by childbirth. The ones that are terrified of aging. The ones that feel like they are never, no, never not keenly aware of how they look or what they ate or what they will be eating, the ones chained to a scale or a number or a glossy Photoshopped-ideal.

Sure, I will talk and teach and train but I am learning this: you will sing my songs.


And so I will sing a song of wonder and beauty about womanhood for you to learn from my lips.

I will lead the resistance of these lies in our home by living out a better truth.

I will not criticise my sisters for how they look or live, casting uncharitable words like stones, because my words of criticism or judgement have a strange way of being more boomerang than missile, swinging around to lodge in your own hearts.

I'll wear a bathing suit and I won't tug on it self-consciously. I will get my hair wet.

I will easily change my clothes in front of your Dad, proud of my stretch marks that gave us a family, of breasts that nourished his babies.

I will prove to you that you can be a size 12 and still be sexier than hell.

I will prove to you that you don't have to be all angles and corners, that there is room for some softness because you all love to hug on my soft bits, burrowing into my arms and my breasts to rest for a while.

I will eat dessert and raise my glass and laugh my way to deeper smile lines.

I will celebrate your own beauty, my tall girls, but I will do my best to praise your mind, your heart, your motives as much as I praise your beauty.

I will not let the words "I'm fat" cross my lips - especially in front of you, my beautiful girls.

I will celebrate beauty where I find it, in a million faces uniquely handcrafted by a generous God with a big tent of glorious womanhood.

I will tell stories of women and surround you with a community of women who are smart and strong, crazy and hot-headed, gentle and kind, women who love and you will see that this is what is beautiful, that a generous love is the most gorgeous thing you could ever put on.

I love you.

Mummy

O Merciful God

The amazing prayer offered by the seventeen-year-old Lady Jane Grey from her prison cell before she was beheaded in 1554:

O merciful God, be Thou unto me

A strong Tower of defence,

I humbly entreat Thee.

Give me grace to await Thy leisure,

And patiently to bear

What Thou doest unto me;

Nothing doubting or mistrusting

Thy goodness towards me;

For Thou knowest what is good for me

Better than I do.

Therefore do with me in all things

What Thou wilt;

Only arm me, I beseech Thee,

With Thine armor,

That I may stand fast;

Above all things taking to me

The shield of faith;

Praying always that I may

Refer myself wholly to Thy will,

Abiding Thy pleasure, and comforting myself

In those troubles which it shall please Thee

To send me, seeing such troubles are

Profitable for me, and I am

Assuredly persuaded that all Thou doest

Cannot but be well; and unto Thee

Be all honor and glory.

Amen

The Blessing of a Storm

The Blessing of a Storm

I did not know His love before,

the way I know it now.

I could not see my need for Him,

my pride would not allow.

I had it all, without a care,

the "self-sufficient" lie.

My path was smooth, my sea was still,

not a cloud was in my sky.

I thought I knew His love for me,

I thought I'd seen His grace,

I thought I did not need to grow,

I thought I'd found my place.

But then the way grew rough and dark,

the storm clouds quickly rolled;

The waves began to rock my ship,

I found I had no hold.

The ship that I had built myself

was made of foolish pride,

It fell apart and left me bare,

with nowhere else to hide.

I had no strength or faith to face

the trials that lay ahead,

And so I simply spoke His name

and bowed my weary head.

His loving arms enveloped me,

and then He helped me stand.

He said, "You still must face this storm,

but I will hold your hand."

So through the dark and lonely night

He guided me through pain.

I could not see the light of day

or when I'd smile again.

Yet through the pain and endless tears,

my faith began to grow.

I could not see it at the time,

but my light began to glow.

I saw God's love in brand new light,

His grace and mercy, too.

For only when all self was gone could Jesus'

love shine through.

It was not easy in the storm,

I sometimes wondered why.

At times I thought, "I can't go on."

I'd hurt, and doubt, and cry.

But Jesus never left my side

He guided me each day,

Through pain and strife, through fire and flood,

He helped me all the way.

And now I see as ne'er before

how great His love can be,

How in my weakness He is strong,

how Jesus cares for me!

He worked it all out for my good,

although the way was rough.

He only sent what I could bear,

and then He said, "Enough!"

He raised His hand and said, "Be still!"

He made the storm clouds cease.

He opened up the gates of joy

and flooded me with peace.

I saw His face now clearer still,

I felt His presence strong,

I found anew His faithfulness,

He never did me wrong.

And now I know more storms will come,

but only for my good,

For pain and tears have helped me grow

as nothing ever could.

I still have so much more to learn

as Jesus works in me;

If in the storm I'll love Him more,

that's where I want to be!

~Wendy Greiner Lefko~

copyright 1996

Thy Brother's Blood

Thy Brother’s Blood – A Vision for Souls

The tom-toms thumped straight on all night, and the darkness shuddered round me like a living, feeling thing. I could not go to sleep, so I lay awake and looked; and I saw, as it seemed, this:

That I stood on a grassy patch, and at my feet a ravine broke straight down into infinite space. I looked, but saw no bottom; only cloud shapes, black and furiously coiled, and great shadow-shrouded hollows, and unfathomable depths. Back I drew, dizzy at the depth.

Then I saw forms of people moving toward the edge. There was a woman with a baby in her arms and another little child holding on to her dress. She was on the very edge. She lifted her foot for the next step... Then, to my horror, I saw that she was blind. Before I could say anything she was over, and the children with her. Their cries pierced the air as they fell into the inky blackness of the ravine!

Then I saw more streams of people flowing from all quarters. All were blind, stone blind; all walked straight toward the edge. There were shrieks as they suddenly knew themselves falling, and a tossing up of helpless arms, catching, clutching at empty air. But some went over quietly, and fell without a sound.

Then I wondered, with a wonder that was sheer agony, why no one stopped them at the edge. I could not. I was glued to the ground, and I couldn't even yell; though I strained and tried, only a whisper would come out.

Then I saw that along the edge there were sentries set at intervals.

But the intervals were too large; there were wide, unguarded gaps between. And over these gaps the people fell in their blindness, unwarned; and the green grass seemed blood-red to me, and the ravine yawned like the mouth of hell.

Then I saw, like a little picture of peace, a group of people under some trees with their backs turned towards the ravine. They were making daisy chains. Sometimes when a piercing shriek cut the quiet air and reached them, it disturbed them and they thought it was a rather crude noise. And if one of their group started up and wanted to go and do something to help, then all the others would pull that one down. "Why should you get so excited about it? You must wait for a definite call to go! You haven't finished your daisy chain yet. It would be really selfish," they said, "to leave us to finish the work alone."

There was another group. It was made up of people whose great desire was to get more sentries out; but they found that very few wanted to go, and sometimes there were no sentries for miles and miles along the edge.

Once a girl stood alone in her place, waving the people back; but her mother and other relations called, and reminded her that her furlough was due; she must not break the rules. And being tired and needing a change, she had to go and rest for awhile; but no one was sent to guard her gap, and over and over the people fell, like a waterfall of souls. Once a child grabbed at a tuft of grass that grew at the very edge of the ravine; it clung convulsively, and it called - but nobody seemed to hear. Then the roots of the grass gave way, and with a cry the child went over, its two little hands still holding tight to the torn-off bunch of grass. And the girl who longed to be back in her gap thought she heard the little one cry, and she sprang up and wanted to go; at which her friends reproved her, reminding her that no one is necessary anywhere; "The gap would be well taken care of!", they said. And then they sang a hymn.

Then through the hymn came another sound like the pain of a million broken hearts wrung out in one full drop, one sob. And a horror of great darkness was upon me, for I knew that it was "The Cry of the Blood".

Then a voice thundered. It was the voice of the Lord, and He said, "What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground."

The tom-toms still beat heavily, the darkness still shuddered and shivered about me; I heard the yells of the devil-dancers and weird, wild shrieks of the devil-possessed just outside the gate. What does it matter, after all? It has gone on for years; it will go on for years. Why make such a fuss about it?

God forgive us! God arouse us! Shame us out of our callousness! Shame us out of our sin!


"Thy Brother’s Blood Crieth" by Amy Carmichael, Missionary to India,

Never Again

I came across this story that I had written, over a year ago, when I was first headed to the New Tribes Missionary Training Center.  It no longer seems fitting to my life, but someone might benefit from it, so I'm posting it anyway.  :)



(Walking with Him in the cool of the evening....)


*looking up, with a sigh*  I was ashamed today....

Ashamed, Dearest?  Of me? 

Yes.  Well no.  I mean, I didn't MEAN to be.  I just... I found myself blurting out a misleading answer to a simple question.  And before I knew it, I was...I was avoiding the opportunity to talk about you, and rambling on about....some trivial thing.

What 'trivial thing?'

Well, see, they asked me about college, and then if I was going to grad school.  And I AM going to a KIND of school....after I have graduated, so...I said yes.  Then they asked for more details, and I just, kinda, acted like I'm continuing in music-training, post-college...

Why did you feel like you needed to do that?

Well.....I don't know.  They didn't look like people who would care about...I mean, who would understand if I said that I was...I...I don't really know.  Somehow, I thought it would just be simpler to mention music and move on.

But they didn't move on?

No...they kept prodding.  And by then, I had to keep on running circles around their questions so that it would SOUND credible, without actually lying.

Did you think you would get a better tip that way?

Oh, no, I didn't really think about the money.

Did you think they would mock you if you told them you were pursuing missions?

No...I don't think so....

What happened after that?

Well....it turned out that they were believers, too.  They started telling me about activities at their church, and, well....  Immediately I was ashamed of mySELF, for having acted ashamed of you.  I don't know why I didn't just tell them in the first place.  I don't know why....I'm sorry.  I'm so sorry.  I'm NOT ashamed of You, of the Gospel.  I'm so proud and blessed to be a part.    I WANT to be a part...I want to share it with others.  I don't understand why I responded that way.

Dearest, I am never ashamed of you.

......I know.....


I WANT to include you in what I'm doing to bring glory to my name, to see the nations come to know me, to see people from EVERY tribe, tongue, and language praising me on earth, and before my thrown in Heaven.


....I know......I don't know why I responded the way I did.  Please forgive me.  Please make my perspective to ALWAYS be focused on you, boldly sharing about my love for you.  Please fill my heart so full of your love for others that it spills out in everyday conversation.  Please make me SO EXCITED about what you're doing, that I want to share that with EVERYONE I meet, even if it's "random people" at work.  I know nothing is random with you.


You can trust me to do all of these things.  As we spend this time together, I am aligning your heart with mine, filling you with MY love for others.  It's because of MY love that you can love others, and desire to show them my love.  I love you more than you will ever be able to comprehend or imagine.

I love you too....Please teach me how to love you more....

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day comes with chocolates and flowers. But it's not that way for all of us, is it?

We live in a world where "happily ever after" doesn't always come true.

So today if you find yourself with a sweetheart, celebrate with much joy.

And if you don't, let me lean and whisper you are still loved.
Higher than the sky.
Deeper than the ocean.
More than you've even dared to dream.
The hairs on your head are numbered.
The cares in your heart are too.
You are fearfully and wonderfully made.
You are have a purpose and there is a good plan for you.
You are not alone--you are fully and beautifully known by One who loves you more than you can even imagine.

I just wanted to whisper that to your heart again, especially today.

-Holley Gerth