Today’s Quote: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”-2Corinthians 5:17
Today’s Song: “The Words I Would Say”- Sidewalk Prophets
Children are like cucumbers.
They are fresh, and crisp and new.
I love kids.
I love their innocence.
I love their freedom and power.
Just the word “kids” is refreshing like a breath of cool air. They are so unselfconscious and playful and in the moment. I want to be more like that.
They have all the things that adults are trying to get back, like youth and vibrancy, and rawness and fun.
Real fun.
Not fun that needs drinks or is at the expense of our dignity.
Kids are just innocent. They have God all over them, and it’s undeniable.
But something, somewhere along the way gets us and we become these:
prideful,
sinful,
petty
adults.
But we still recognize it in children, their innocence, and we long to protect it in them.
Oh Lord, everything in me that is motherly wants to spring to protective action on behalf of these little ones. As I watch these little 10,11 & 12 year-old girls starting to stand up and take notice of what’s around them and their bodies and the way that older girls look and act and dress.
Quietly mimicking us.
“The entire generation of adult women in any
culture is systematically raising the next, whether they mean to be or not.”- Beth Moore
Would you ever tell your young, wild, tangley-haired little cousin to put on skin-tight pants, high heels, and flaunt her best assets?
No way!
At least I hope not.
I think we would all be quick to say something more like:
“Slow down! Be young! Don’t worry about what all of these boys think about you. That doesn’t define who you are! Besides, when the time is right, the right one will come and sweep you off your feet when you least expect it. Just grow, be yourself, and live!”
But why can’t we seem get that into our own heads?
What we are doing, and where we are seeking our own affirmation is speaking volumes louder than what we are saying.
And whether we want to admit it or not, we are being watched.
One of my biggest desires as a mommy is to protect my daughter from getting caught in that sprawling fishing net of constantly being conscious of what everyone thinks of her.
How everyone sees her.
That one that somehow manages to catch us all.
I want her to be caught up in life! In Jesus!!
I have seen this quote that says:
“You can’t change a pickle back into a cucumber.”
Meaning once certain things have gotten in, there’s no going back.
I would have to agree, in part.
We ourselves will never be capable of turning back the hands of time on all that life has done to us. All that we have done to ourselves. All of the ways that living and this world have just eaten away at our most precious girlish parts.
It just doesn’t seem fair.
We are all pickles, longing for the wholeness and dreams of our cucumber days.
Jesus, girls. Jesus.
He is in the business of turning pickles back into cucumbers.
And He’s the only one who can do it!
I’m not talking about some distant religious concept....
I’m talking about Him literally restoring, and making new all of those parts of us that have been damaged.
I hope that you’ve started to experience that for yourself.
But are there areas in which you’ve not allowed yourself to open up to Him yet?
What shame are you carrying around that you feel can never be undone?
Maybe you’ve had an abortion.
Maybe you’ve had several.
Maybe you’ve been molested.
Maybe it was a relative who did it.
Maybe it’s the simple loss of your purity, or the guilt of something that you did to a loved one.
Or anything else colossally larger or smaller than those!
Girls, life is too real for us to keep playing around.
To keep covering up and distracting ourselves from what’s been done to us.
From what we’ve done.
You have a God who is waiting right there to heal you!
To REALLY heal you!
Anything that is a weight to you, is a concern to God.
A God who knows you and wants to heal you more intimately than you could ever imagine.
Every corner. Every deep-down hidden place.
NO MATTER WHAT YOU’VE DONE- OR WHAT’S BEEN DONE TO YOU! HIS DESIRE IS TO LOVE AND HEAL YOU!
Allow Him!
Bring those things before Him in all of their rawness and hurt and honesty, and cry them bitterly at His feet.
Let them out!!
Even if you feel like it might hurt or you might never stop crying. He’s there!!! And He has your healing waiting.
Let Him make you whole.
Let Him change you back into a cucumber!
There’s nothing like it!!
To be picked up, dusted off, and set on our feet to really live!
You can really get on living, a whole and wholesome life!
You can truly defy the gravity of this life!
And I’m sorry for seeming so excited, but IT’S EXCITING!!
The whole thought of actually being able to be that confident and beautiful and whole girl that we would want our little cousin or our niece to become.
And to show her that you can actually be that way in this world, through Jesus.
And to be so caught up in real living and able to have real fun because you are a cucumber again!!!
Imagine the kind of love story you could have…
Today’s Dare: Today is an important day. It’s time to release all of those hidden, deep down, secret things that you’ve been holding back from God. The stuff that maybe you’ve been fooling yourself and saying doesn’t matter. Or you have built up such a wall around it that you almost feel numb about it.
Ask God to break down those walls and have a good cry. Have a GREAT cry. Get your pillow ready because it might be a loud one! Your healing begins today.
Also, if you have a younger girl in your life that you know looks up to you, think about all of the things that you would want her to become. That innocence that you want her to hold on to. And as you are crying, ask God to restore you back to innocence, so that you can be a living role-model to her!
