The Dream of You by Jo Saxton & Ann Voskamp

Author:Jo Saxton & Ann Voskamp
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2018-01-23T05:00:00+00:00

You are fully known. He has seen it all and He knows it all. And still you are deeply, deeply loved.

There are others who see a person they used to be. In their closets are the sizes they used to wear. They feel the shame of still caring about the difference.

Some of you haven’t stood in front of a full-length mirror for quite some time now. You step to the edges when family photos are being taken, or you only take pictures of the children. It’s simply too hard to see yourself in photos.

Some of you take pictures, but they’re never candid. They are staged, filtered, positioned until they are Instagram-worthy. You don’t mean to count the “Likes,” note the comments. You tell yourself you don’t want to care. But every click on social media has become a statement about your body and your value. You don’t want it to matter so much to you. But it does.

You are fully known. He has seen it all and He knows it all. And still you are deeply, deeply loved.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;

test me and know my anxious thoughts.

Point out anything in me that offends you,

and lead me along the path of everlasting life. (Psalm 139:23–24)

Even though these verses come at the end of the psalm, I often use these words as an opening prayer. Sometimes it’s my way of inviting God to argue my case against my inner voices. Sometimes it’s a way for me to slow down to see where I am. In relation to my body and who I am, these words scan my heart, my mind, my everything. They’ve led me back to my flashing-light verses. They’ve leveled me and liberated me.

I am not who anyone but God says I am. I am not even who I say I am, or more often, who I fear I might be. I am God’s, and only God can identify me truly.

Perhaps the words of Psalm 139:23–24 can be your first words as you stand in front of the mirror. Invite God to meet you right then, in that moment, before any other voice can intrude. Then wait. And then begin. Using Psalm 139:14, acknowledge that your body, your personality, your talents, all of you is fearfully and wonderfully made.

There will be other verses, psalms, chapters, and books from the Bible that God highlights for you. The words will shout at you and won’t allow you to keep reading until you take the brightly lit words to heart. The dark recesses of your struggling will fall to God’s offensive weapon—the sword of the Spirit, the truth, the only words you can always, without reservation, trust.

Take hold of them, write them down, put them on your phone, and write them on your mirror if you need to. His words have the power to level and liberate you, a Spirit-filled sword to cut through the most resistant of chains. I think they can help you see into the mirror differently.

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