wonderfully made

I have frizzy hair. I have dry skin. I am not a size 0. 

I am selfish. I eat unhealthy foods more than I should. I can be a hypocrite at times.

I am flawed.

I may not have a Victoria's Secret Angel body. 

I may not be the smartest person out there.

I may not be the best wife, mother or friend you can find.

But do you know what I am?

I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

God made me in His image.

His image is pretty great, don't you think? 

"Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out;

you formed me in my mother's womb.

I think you, High God - you're breathtaking!

Body and soul, I am marvelously made!

I worship in adoration - what a creation!

You know me inside and out,

you know every bone in my body;

You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,

how I was sculpted from nothing into something.

Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;

all the stages of my life were spread out before you,

The days of my life all prepared

before I'd even lived one day."

Psalm 139:13-16 (MSG)

It seems to me that God put a lot of thought into creating me. He didn't just throw me together and hope I turned out okay. He knitted me together in my mother's womb. Before I was born, He knew me. He sculpted me from nothing into a beautiful creation.

But I am a sinner. I'm not perfect, I mess up. I don't always have it together. I hate the way I look some days. 

I beat myself up over my failures. I focus on my flaws.

That's so unhealthy!

I know that I'm not the only one who does this. As a mom, it's so easy to get down on yourself when you have a bad day. You want to call it quits before noon because you yelled at your kid. You avoid mirrors because you haven't lost all the pregnancy weight and your youngest is 4 years old. You tell yourself that you're not good enough. 

Why do we do this?

The enemy likes to put negative thoughts in our mind. Thoughts that we're not good enough, not pretty enough, not smart enough... flawed. 

But remember what God says - you are His perfect creation and He loves you!

He made you in His image. He didn't mess up when He made you. You are wonderfully made.

Every time you tell yourself how flawed you are, it becomes easier to say it the next time you mess up. Every day that you wake up, look in the mirror and sigh, it's easier to do the next day. Stop doing that to yourself! How do you think God feels when you tell Him that He messed up, that you're flawed, that you're not good enough?

You know what? It's true - I AM flawed. I am not perfect. I will mess up, I will make mistakes, I will have bad days. But I can get back up, brush myself off and learn from it. I may wake up with messy hair and I may not like the number on the scale.

But I'm just me. I can try every day to be the best 'me' that I can - the 'me' God wants me to be. And when I fall down, I can ask God to lift me back up so I can keep going. It all starts with getting the lies from Satan out of my head. I need to repeat Psalm 139:14 every day to remind myself who I am in Christ. 

Say it with me: I am fearfully and wonderfully made! 

Now keep saying it, over & over. ;)