Graceful

Do you ever start reading a book and feel like it was written just for you?

A few days ago, I started reading the book Graceful: Letting Go of Your Try-Hard Life. I am so glad I did. It is not an ordinary Christian book for girls; it does not map out any dating rules, tell you to obey your parents, guide you in how to manage media, or teach you how to be a good Christian girl. This book starts with the good girl. The girl whose followed the rules her whole life. The responsible one with a good image. It takes the good girl and removes her masks. In this book, Emily delves into the many roles girls can play and shows that simply trusting God is much more valuable than having it all together. "Emily Freeman gives young women what they need to be set free on the inside, no matter what is going on outside." 

Why am I so excited about this book? Because it is tying together what I've been trying to figure out for three years. Well, actually, it's not tying anything together. God is doing the tying, He is just using this book. When I was about fourteen years old, I realized something about myself. I wasn't myself! I had built up a reputation for being a good girl, but it was a mask and I could not remove it because I had no idea what I really looked like. "What a long time it can take to become the person one has always been! How often in the process we mask ourselves in faces that are not our own" (Parker J. Palmer). All my life I have been pretty much the same:  kind, sweet, reliable, responsible, innocent. I wore a purity ring, went to church every Sunday, got good grades, obeyed my parents, and worked hard. I've never been beautiful or stunning, but I'm "cute"; the perfect good girl with a pretty smile. For the first fourteen years of my life, I pretty much went with the flow.

Then one day something got out of alignment, and I felt like a liar. Suddenly, I was not happy, even though around my friends-- and often times my family-- I would act that way. I thought I had broken myself, when all I had really done was crack my mask. I went through everyday confused at who I was. Was I really this sweet girl I had been my whole life? If I wasn't her, who was I?

Then my freshman year of track I learned I was not born a runner. I was 5' 2" and dense. Every race, I came in behind girls who had long legs and not much weight to carry. I knew if I wanted to run well, I would have to look like them. I was upset with my genetics because they were holding me back in the thing I loved the most: running.

 As my weight rose, my spirits sunk. I was not proud of my body and that part of my identity was poisoned. Everything I knew was being stripped away. I was sad... but that was not me! It wasn't the image I'd accumulated.

 I lost my "all-together" image and had nothing to replace it.

I'm not sure I ever really found the answer for the replacement. I just found myself some super glue and put my mask together to hurry it back across my face before anyone realized it was gone. Before I knew it I had re-adopted my good girl image. Life went on. Until God decided to show me my true identity when I forgot to beg for it.

I didn't expect God to answer my two-year-old questions when I went to camp the summer of 2012. I just wanted to have fun and meet some new people-- God had a whole other plan. It was one of the most pathetic weeks of my life.  It was probably my own fault, I was pretty closed off.

It is sometimes hard not to look back on that time and think about how miserable and lonely I was, when in reality it was a major step toward my understanding of Christ. It was true... I had no friends at camp. But in that circumstance, sure to bring me to discouragement, I figured out who I really was. One of the first seminars of the week was on the sufficiency of Christ and we read through Galatians for devos. I remember listening to those words about the power of Jesus' blood. I remember sitting at a picnic table discovering grace. I remember walking in the woods and, while everyone else was chatting, thinking about who I was in light of these things.

That week, God showed me who I was. I didn't ask to be told, but He declared to me that I was HIS daughter, that my debt had been paid and that that is who I was. His. I was not a just good girl, I was His girl. I had been paid for and there was nothing I could do to deserve that, I was saved by GRACE. 

Since then, I've been struggling a lot to know what that means. What it means for when I fall, and for the scars that adorn my past. This month I had to figure out what it meant for my striving. I figured out my identity, I just wasn't quite ready to dispose of the mask. I've been holding on to it very tightly this past year, but it is getting heavier and I am considering putting it down for good.

In that, this book has helped me. It's helping me get past my Christian transcript to show me that it is all worthless without grace. My good image isn't my identity; who I am is behind the mask, the girl Jesus lived and died for, that is who I am. He already lived the perfect life, so I don't need to.

"For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose." Galatians 2:19-21



Also, I should let you know, the book Graceful is only $2.99 for Kindel. I'm not sure how long this will last, but I think it is definitely worth three bucks! And Galatians is free :) Exceedingly more excellent and the living words of God!