I'm too messed up for God to love!

Maria greeted her family with a smile and tried not to show how much she hurt inside. Today, the doctor told her, once again, to lose weight. She is putting too much stress on her heart and joints. But she loves the comfort that rich foods bring. I know I’m fat. At least my doctor is honest with me. Everybody else just tells me what a pretty face I have.

By day Kim is an outgoing sales manager on the move. By night she hides in her apartment and goes on uncontrollable feed- ing frenzies. Kim learned she could eat everything she wanted and still lose weight with self-induced vomiting. She has lived with bulimia for eight years and swears she’ll stop. Today is the last day. But she can’t beat the cycle.

Anna, a mother of two, loves to cook for her family, but her family barely notices that she doesn’t eat her own cooking. Anna is determined to stay thin at any cost, which includes restricting her daily diet to three hundred calories and abusing substances like diet pills, diuretics, and laxatives. Daily her small frame weakens, yet she wants to be thinner. If I just lose five more pounds, then I’ll be truly satisfied and happy. Katrina looks in the mirror and sees “repulsive,” “fat,” “stupid,” even though friends tell her she is one of the most intelligent and beautiful girls in her college. If I’m so beautiful, why can’t I see it?

Jasmine gets up at 3 a.m. to exercise for three hours before school. She feels extremely guilty for missing a workout despite recurring injuries. Perhaps you see yourself in one or all of these women. I did. I did all I could to hide the secrets and my character flaws from friends, family, and God. Yet God knew everything about me already. He knows everything about you. You may erroneously assume that He feels about you the way you feel about yourself. If we hate ourselves, we assume God hates us too. I contend then that you really don’t know him.

Like any other person, if we do not take the time to get to know our heavenly Father then we will most likely find we are not able to see ourselves as His child and trust Him for our healing or future. That is why we are going to talk about God’s character first. The apostle Peter said, "Do you want more and more of God’s kindness and peace? Then learn to know him better and better. For as you know him better, he will give you, through his great power, everything you need for living a truly good life: he even shares his own glory and his own goodness with us!" (2 Peter 1:2–3, TLB, my emphasis). It’s time for change. It is time to open our eyes and minds and prepare for big changes. God will provide the encouragement and patience to persevere and enable powerful transformation. He is a safe Person.

This is an excerpt from the book "I’m Beautiful? Why Can’t I See It?" by author Kimberly Davidson