Mirror, mirror...

So yesterday was Bible study day for me and it was so good to be back with my girls after missing a week leading up to our ladies' event. These are the women who know me best and who help keep me from ending up in a padded cell. They are amazing women who are working thru their messy middles just like me.

At one point during our conversation, how we look managed to push its way to the surface. We were talking about how sometimes when we are out we catch a glimpse of our reflection in a window or a mirror and we wonder who that women staring back at us could possibly be because we surely don't recognize her...even though we might have felt okay about how we looked when we left the house that morning. One of my friends then asked the question..."How many of you have a magic mirror?" We looked at her perplexed and then she explained. She shared how a magic mirror makes what it's reflecting look really good. It makes you feel like you can go out and tackle the world. It can even convince you that maybe you really have lost a couple of pounds. Do you have one? It's the mirror in your very own bathroom. It's the one that I check myself in before I leave the house and the one with whom, for the most part, I am fairly content with its assessment of me. 

As we pondered how a mirror at home could give us such a different feeling than anywhere else we catch a glimpse of ourselves, one of my other friends said, "It's because that's the mirror in the one place where we are loved and accepted just as we are...HOME!!!" Do you see it? At home we're with the people who love us unconditionally. At home we don't have anything to prove. At home we can put away the Spanx and whatever else we use to create a more svelte figure and "let it all hang out"! We don't have to recite a little ditty for it to talk nice to us. 

LOVE makes that mirror do what it does!!!

What an amazing concept and one that would radically change, not only how we look at ourselves, but how we talk to ourselves if we took it at its word. We're so hard on ourselves and we talk to ourselves in ways we would never talk to anyone else. If only we could be as gentle and caring with "us" as we are with others. If only we could realize that our value is not based on how we look on the outside, but by Jesus on the inside!! Ultimately, that love originates with Him and that love transforms how we see ourselves.

We are fearfully and wonderfully made. We are created with great worth and purpose. We are His girls and He sees us as His princesses. Let's not let a lying reflection steal what He wants us to believe about ourselves!! 

"Just as water mirrors your face,

so your face mirrors your heart."

Proverbs 27:19

Lord, please help me believe what You say about me. I want my face to be a reflection of who You are and what You say about me. Please help me to not get caught up in the world's definition of beauty, but to realize that I'll never be more beautiful than when I am content with You and content with who I am in You. Magic mirrors are nice, but they are no substitute for the peace I find in You!!