Dear God,

Dear God

I've been trying awful hard to make You proud of me

But it seems

The harder that I try, all the harder it becomes

And I feel like giving up

Most of the time

Dear God

I've been chasing their approval and it's killin' me

And I know

The more I try to prove

All the less I have to show

And I'm stuck inside my head

Most of the time

But if I pray a little harder

If I follow all the rules

I wonder, could I ever be enough?

Lyrics by: Cory Asbury

On January 30th, I began jotting down a few topics that I wanted to blog about simply because they are areas in my life that I’ve personally been wrestling with and I know that I’m not alone. Truth is, others just don’t openly discuss it. One of the topics was, “Feeling Loved”. Since then, I’ve touched this entry multiple times and here I am again. Have there ever been seasons in your life where you have been consumed with feeling unloved, unworthy, and rejected? Same here, obviously.

When I speak of feeling unloved, unworthy, and rejected, there are many who could make us feel these ways and could apply to any one person or multiple people. You may feel these ways at the hands of your children, in-laws, friends, family, a partner, and the list could very well go on. Then there is God. Have you ever felt unloved by God or questioned where He is amidst your darkness? I have and still do. Unfortunately, there are more days than not lately. I’m not going to hide my doubts or feelings from Him because He’s already well aware of exactly how I feel. He knows the exact number of hairs on my head and had my life planned out before I was even a thought, so I’m certain that He knows if I’m not feeling loved by Him or others that I, in fact, love so endlessly. Some days I feel alone and as if He isn’t even aware that I exist. In the past, I’d turn to things that did make me feel loved and secure, none of which were healthy. Sometimes, that’s still the case. The most unhealthy thing I tend to do though is run in the opposite direction of where the true agape love resides. Jesus.

Since I was a child, I’ve felt much differently than what others seem to. I’ve always been the shyest one in the room until I feel accepted by those around me. Even then, I’m not the best at opening up but I never fail at letting others open up to me. I was both blessed and cursed with an enormous heart that has the capacity to hold a million times more love than most people I’ve encountered in my almost 36 years of life. Empathetic is my middle name and I probably feel a person's pain more than they do. I’ve always had a heart for others, but have never given my heart to the one person who deserves it most. Myself. Because I’ve never had a heart for myself, I felt and sometimes still feel as if God doesn’t have a heart for me either.

I’ve wrestled with feeling unloved, unworthy, and rejected off and on my entire life whether it be with someone I’ve dated, my family, my friends, others who may have surrounded me, and last but not least, God. I am not shy when saying that I have had and still have difficulty believing and accepting just how much God truly loves me and maybe you do as well. Have you ever questioned God's love for you? If I doubt and question God’s love for me, then how will I ever be able to not question the love of earthly flesh? As I wrote in a previous entry, trusting and having faith are two things that I am not a pro at. Believing just how much God loves me may very well top the list. If it’s not #1, it surely lies right beneath.

Years ago, I learned in therapy that we tend to view our Heavenly Father in the same manner that we view our earthly fathers. Who knew? A few months ago, eleven simple words in the basement of my church brought so much clarity to a void that has forever filled my heart. While attending a spirit-led paint class held by Adaia Schultz, she said something that felt as if an atomic bomb had made contact with my soul. I wrote down her words as I took brief moments to pause, attempting to process what she had spoken. Adaia said, “Our self image is a reflection of our image in Christ”. My heart sank. My self image has always been a reflection of how I’ve seen myself through God’s eyes simply because of the words and actions of others. It’s all I’ve known as “true”. Take a minute to meditate on those words and re-evaluate your worth.

My mind raced as I imagined God saying the things and treating me in the same manner others have. Ya know, all the things that have created negative thoughts in my head about myself. Does He truly see me as unworthy and as a failure? Does he condemn me because I’m chubbier than the average person or does he notice my rolls and stretch marks the same way that I do? Does He say that I’m unable to speak His truth and touch the lives of others just because I am not perfect, because I sin, and because I have many flaws? Does He require me to audition when I pray for Him to use me? Does He see my shyness as being rude or does He truly understand and accept my insecurities? Is He a God who tells me that I am incapable of reaching others who battle mental health issues, simply because I too wrestle with my own lifelong mental illness? Does He scream like the flesh of the earth with words such as psycho, crazy, or delusional when He is angry with me or does He understand that mental health issues, in fact, make me none of those words? Does He think I’m a lost cause or unlovable because I lash out in defense when someone hurts me? Does He think I cry too much or does He truly understand and care about the reasons I am sad? Is He the one who sits with me in church each Sunday (when I even make it) and tells me that I’ll never measure up to all of those other perfect people or that I'll never have the perfect lives that they all seem to have? Does He say that there is no way He’d ever use me to plant seeds in the lives of others? Does He really think and say those things or ever remotely treat me in any of those ways? I cannot recall one time. But guess who has? A large majority of people I’ve loved throughout my lifetime.

One thing I didn’t realize before therapy is that once we are beaten down so far, we begin believing lies about ourselves. Satan manipulates our already weak minds to believe all of those words of hatred and negativity to be true. This in turn, a lot of times, becomes our identity. Instead of learning and knowing our identity in Christ, we take on the identity that every other person has created for our lives and we place a price tag on ourselves. You see, my price tag has become so worn and tattered from being marked down, covered up with one discounted price after another, that I’ve finally become the last item on the shelf, hoping I’d somehow get lucky enough for just one person to see just how beautiful my sparkle is, and finally take me home. Perhaps you’ve felt or currently feel the same. Or perhaps you don’t. I never knew the way others “loved” me would determine how I thought God loved me. I’d be lying if I said I don’t struggle with this still on a daily basis. I do. It’s a very difficult mindset to break when your price tag has been marked with “FREE”. The way others have loved me has also determined the love that I have for myself. When I say the word “others”, I’m not just referring to a person I’ve dated. This goes much further than any significant other.

I automatically thought of being marked with “FREE” in a negative way and as if I was of no value to anyone. Of course my therapist got a preview of this entry before anyone else and he pointed out something very pertinent. He understood the meaning of my message, but he also saw me through the lens of God. What he pointed out is that I truly am marked with “FREE”. That is God’s word. Jeff turned my negative into a positive which is something I’ve not been very good with because I’ve been conditioned to think otherwise. When I searched scripture about freedom, Galatians 5:1 had my name written all over it. It says, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” Since a child, I have been burdened by a yoke of slavery. I have been a slave to other people's actions, words, and/or opinions of and towards me. I’ve allowed those who surround me to determine my worth and place their own price tag on me. I’ve learned that when a person places a reduced or free price tag on another person, it’s because they’ve placed a low value on themselves. Individuals with reduced or free price tags on themselves fear competition with something of higher value. I am learning that I am of high value and that the enemy lies. My high value price tag and free price tag ultimately go hand in hand. I am of high value yet also free because God tells me so. You don’t and won’t tell me so.

I fail when I expect others to love me in return, the same way that I love them. I’ve tried so hard to make sense of why others don’t or can’t love the way that I do. Even though I have spent my entire life deeply struggling with feeling loved, I feel as if loving others and having a genuine heart is the simplest task God has sat in front of me. I hope throughout my time spent on earth, I can teach at least one person how to love. I may not be perfect and I am human but I do know how to love. One thing in this life that I genuinely feel good at. Loving. If I can love others this much, then why is it so difficult for others to love me? And why do I find it so difficult to believe that God truly loves me? If I am made in God's image, then that means I am LOVE and how could He not love someone made in His own image? That probably made you think for a minute, didn’t it? Yeah, me too. I actually don’t even know how my brain concocted that but those words came from Him, not me.

If you haven’t noticed, all of my blog entries relate to a song that has a special meaning and that God has used to speak to me. The song tied to this entry is, Dear God. I have really been battling with negative thoughts, worrying about pleasing others, trying to measure up to their expectations, wondering why I don’t receive the same love in return that I so freely hand out, questioning if I’m even worthy of being loved, whether or not God is proud of me, if He even sees how sad I am, or just how unloved I truly feel. Some day, which begins today, I will attempt to no longer have these questions, simply because I don’t need to. As of 10:37 pm on June 22nd, 2023, when the enemy fills my mind with lies, I’ll speak the truth with exactly what God is saying when He looks down on me from the skies. “I just love that little Alicia.”