Category: beauty

February 17, 2016 beauty, beauty from ashes, belief, Biblical womanhood, Christ, Christian, darkness, God, grace, lies, light, redeemed, redemption, relationships, self-image, trust, women, worth

Finding Freedom From the Lies We Believe (A Contributor Post at The Glorious Table)

You are not enough…
If they only knew…
If only my life looked like…
This is how it starts. These statements are the beginning of many of my internal battles. It is exhausting. I long more than anything to be a woman who’s steadfast, unswerving in her identity, and serving Christ with all that she is. And yet I struggle. These thoughts pop up, and Satan fuels the fire with his lies. Soon I am sulking in self-pity, jealousy, and anger.
If I am honest, I have a lifelong pattern of listening to these lies.  They have become familiar friends.
I am not enough. If only I did more, I would be worth more. If I were thinner and prettier, if I were in a relationship, if I got that promotion, then I could cease striving.
Her goodness and success minimizes mine. This is the comparison trap so many of us fall prey to. What can I do to be more like her? Her success will make me look like a failure. Diminishing her value will build my own.
All love for me is conditional.  If they only knew, if they saw everything about me, it would all come crashing down. No one loves me for the true me. Keep pretending; be the person they like.
God will not fulfill His promises; He wants something other than my good. My situation looks nothing like my plans. God is leading me astray. I can control my life. The outcome is better in my hands. God is not safe.

These are the thoughts that keep me up at night. The thoughts that drive a wedge into my relationship with the Lord. It is these little seeds of doubt that flourish into anger and a belief that God is not entirely good.
These are the lies Satan speaks over my life, and maybe over yours as well. The dangerous part is that I begin to agree with them. I slowly write a narrative of these lies over my own life. It is not until they are faced with light and truth that they disappear.
When darkness and light meet, the light always wins.
June 27, 2015 abuse, beauty, beauty from ashes, brokenness, Christ, Christian, church, fear, forgiveness, God, grace, healing, heart, loved, messy grace, rape, redeemed, redemption, sexual abuse, trust

She Matters: Anonymous Guest

This post is a part of She Matters: The Mended Heart Project, a project to bring awareness to stories of overcoming sexual abuse through grace and redemption and an attempt to give survivors a voice. To check out more on this project, see the original post here.




Today’s She Matters story is particularly special. Unlike the other posts, today’s writer is an anonymous contributor for a variety of reasons. While you may not know her, I do. Let me tell you, she is everything this project is about. She is brave beyond belief. She is fighting for herself and other women in her life in courageous, meaningful ways and I am proud to know her. While her name will remain anonymous, I will be sharing the comments with her so please encourage her and let her know what her words and vulnerability mean to you. Let’s cheer on her bravery! 


I swallowed hard in a futile attempt to dislodge the golf ball sized lump that had formed in my throat almost instantaneously upon hearing the voice on the other end of the phone. With some effort, I managed to squeeze the word “okay” out before sinking to the bed to catch my breath. Why, after all of these years, was he calling me now? It’s not like he ever completely left my thoughts, the flashbacks ensured that, but the years of no contact had lessened them. That was undone with a simple hello that day. I battled hard to stuff everything that was beginning to surface back down as I struggled to listen to what he was saying. Someone was making allegations that he had been inappropriate…wanted to be clear on our relationship…could be questioned… My thoughts swirled as the memories of the past collided with the conversation of the present in a violent, yet unseen tornado in my mind. I caught bits and pieces of what he said before hanging up the phone and being swept away by the storm. Closing my eyes as I fought back tears, I drifted away to the time almost ten years prior when I worked for him.

The job had started innocently enough and, at the time, seemed like a blessing in disguise. I wanted a car of my own and it would provide some income. The hours were flexible, which allowed me to continue my involvement in extracurricular activities, and the field was one I was considering as a possible college major. Besides that, I had always been a bit of a computer geek and the work I would be doing would allow me the opportunity to further develop my skills in that area. He wasn’t always there at the office when I worked, but when he was we would chat. He was pretty easy to get along with and seemed down to earth. A short time later, I began experiencing some pain in my leg. He offered to look at it since his area of work was along those lines. Nothing remotely inappropriate had happened or been suggested at that point, so I didn’t think twice about agreeing. What happened next caught me completely off guard and would change me and my life for years to come.

I became concerned when I felt his hand moving up the inside of my right thigh. He responded to my demand to stop by explaining that there were pressure points or something he had to check. Any desire to believe him went out the window when I felt him slip his fingers first inside of my underwear and then inside of me. My second plea for him to stop went unheard and shortly after I felt his mouth following the path his fingers had left. I was 17. I went home that night feeling so sick and so confused about what had happened. I threw up that night, but told everyone it was the flu. I couldn’t talk about it. I wouldn’t have known where to start at the time even if I thought I could have. The next day I went to work planning to quit quietly. He was there waiting and told me he knew I was quitting, along with a lot of reasons I couldn’t/shouldn’t. The manipulations began there and the excuses that existed during the first exploit soon faded away. What happened the evening before became a regular occurrence.

One day, shortly after my 18 birthday, it went further than that when he pinned me to the living room couch and raped me. It was virtually no holds barred from there as the touching, intercourse, forced oral sex, and other things continued for nearly two years. No meant nothing so, after a while, I quit saying it. I still didn’t tell anyone. What would people think? He was twice my age after all. Surely they would blame me. The lies, manipulations, and confusion ensured my silence. Then, just as it had begun, it was over. I didn’t hear from him for years prior to that phone call and never heard from him after it. I have no idea what became of him or the allegations that were being made at that time. I do know that I wasn’t the only one.  

Personally, I tried and for a while was very successful at stuffing it all down.  It wasn’t until after a near breakdown, almost killing myself, and some counseling that I finally, admitted to anyone anything that had happened during that time. Nearly twenty years of keeping a secret I never should have had in the first place almost killed me and did take a toll in a lot of ways. If it hadn’t been for Jesus, a skilled counselor who specialized in trauma, supportive friends, caring family, and a few “Only God” moments, I wouldn’t be here now to be writing this and, possibly for the first time since that day as a teenager, actually enjoying my life instead of simply trying to get through it. There are still some struggles and may always be, but the lies that defined me for so long have finally lost their grip and power. I know who I am and, more importantly, I know Whose I am.

Current statistics show that at least 1 in 6 women will be a victim of sexual assault. If you are currently experiencing any type of sexual abuse, please don’t believe the lies that you are alone, unwanted or unloved. It isn’t your fault. You do matter. If you’ve experienced an assault or abuse in the past, please know that you don’t have to spend your life hiding it, trying to cope on your own, or ashamed. It wasn’t your fault. You are worth it.

There is hope. There is help.


The writer asked that I include a link to Matthew West’s song, Mended, as it so appropriately relates to the project and her story. 

“When you see broken beyond repair
I see healing beyond belief
When you see too far gone
I see one step away from home
When you see nothing but damaged goods
I see something good in the making
I’m not finished yet

When you see wounded, I see mended”
January 3, 2014 beauty, Biblical womanhood, brokenness, chivalry, church, dating, femininity, forgiveness, gender roles, God, grace, heart, I am sorry, loved, marriage, masculinity, porn, relationships, sex, women

I’m Sorry…

 We’ve never met. As a matter of fact, most of you I may never meet. But I owe you an apology….

To the guy who picks up his Bible instead of the Playboy magazine, to the guy who closes his laptop even though no one is watching, to all of you who hold doors, give up seats and through action and word choose to respect the women in your life every day. To the man who never lets a woman’s careless behavior absolve his responsibility to respect and value her. I’m sorry.

You see I grew up in a “boys will be boys” culture. From an early age I learned that men were pigs. I learned to hold my own doors and never ever to need you. God forbid that I should need a man’s help or be vulnerable. I learned that every compliment had hidden intentions, that I should cover up, cross my legs, and leave you in the dust like the independent woman I was expected to be. That’s what society taught me…. and they were wrong.

I’m sorry that we bought into the lie that you were an animal incapable of controlling yourself
I’m sorry that I believed you were all the same
I’m sorry that we lowered the bar and settled for guys who didn’t respect us
I’m sorry that I never took a deeper look into all my misconceptions
I’m sorry that we turned your chivalrous acts into demeaning displays of our weakness
I’m sorry that we cheapened masculinity by making it nothing more than sex, women, and physical strength 

We got it wrong -society, myself, the church- we all did. 

There are plenty of men in the world who fit every stereotype I just mentioned, but then there’s you- the ones I’m actually apologizing to. 

Whether you’re 14 or 40, single or married, you fight a daily battle to keep your mind and heart pure for the woman who will one day deserve it. You choose our worth and value over your temporary satisfaction or pleasure. Thank you.

We need you. As our brothers, our fathers, our friends, our spouses, we need you.  

We need you to validate our worth as more than the number we see on a scale; we need you to tell us that we are treasured and valued because of Whose we are not because of what we do.

At some point and time society decided that wasn’t okay. It wasn’t acceptable for a woman to need a man, in fact it was weakness. The Bible speaks very differently about gender roles though.

 God created us to need each other. Gender roles are more about our souls/spiritual lives and strengths/weaknesses complementing each other when we use them correctly than they are about who makes dinner. A man’s strength guards a woman’s heart and provides a chance for her to be vulnerable. We need that leading as women whether we like to admit it or not. A man’s strength (spiritually speaking, as a leader) should enhance a woman’s beauty by allowing her to be vulnerable. Mutually, a woman’s need for a leader requires a man’s strength and validates him. 

This gets all screwed up in our society because guys grow up learning to disrespect women and girls grow up learning to demonize men and be completely independent. We are told to be strong, independent women and never rely on anyone because that simply leads to heartbreak. Most of the women I know have no idea how to be vulnerable because society doesn’t allow it, but the church should be working to redefine what it means to be a godly man or woman today! 

So I’m sorry for not saying it sooner, but I see you; we see you. We notice when you choose respect us because it’s a choice you make daily. We notice and we’re grateful. Keep it up. And no matter how many times we act like we don’t, we need you. We need godly men who are respectful not just as our future spouses but as our friends, as our brothers in Christ.

So to you who make that choice every day, I’m sorry for not giving you the thanks you deserve. Thank you. From every girl out there trying her best to represent Biblical womanhood- thank you for making the journey a bit easier!
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