Haunted by a Question

I wrote this post a while back but never felt like I could post it.  Im not sure why so I have decided to share this with all of you.  I hope it speaks to you as much as it spoke to me

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I have been reading "Capt.ivat.ing" by Jo.hn and St.asi Elde.red.ge for my quiet time lately and came across a chapter that really radiated through me.  It gave clarity that I think every woman longs for under the surface so I wanted to share some of the key points with you.


(All ideas are taken from the book "Capti.vating.".  I do not take any credit)

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We have been surrounded since birth by fairy tales.  Cinderella. Beauty and the Beast.  Sleeping Beauty.  Stories in which a beautiful woman is fought for and rescued by their Prince from the perils of evil.  We have seen their romance.  We have seen the beauty that got them there. And then... we see that we are not them.




All women are haunted by a question...




Am I lovely?




Do I matter?


Am I worth it?


Do you see me?




Do I captivate you?




Our deepest doubt is that we do not have any genuine beauty to unveil. We try.  Oh! Do we try! New diets, new outfits, new hair color, new exercise regimes.




But still, we are haunted. 


Haunted at the core of our beings because we know, that if we only pass a mirror, we will see that we are not what we were intended to be.


Then the shield rises. We retreat. We hide. Hide in our busyness.  Hide in activities.  Hide in our depression. We begin to believe, "there is nothing captivating about me."




When the world was new and we were innocent, there was nothing to hide.  Adam and Eve lived in a shameless glory.  Until....


Until that serpent convinced Eve that God was holding out on her. Satan convinced Eve that in order to have the best possible life, she must take matters into her own hands.


Sound familiar?


That fall cursed us for life.


"To the woman He said, 'I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children.  Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.'" (Genesis 3:16)


This curse cannot only be limited to babies and marriage.  It encompasses so much more.  Woman is cursed with loneliness (relational heartache), with the urge to control (especially her man), and with the dominance of men (which is not how things were meant to be).


Is that not true?


Arent your deepest worries and heartaches relational?  Arent they linked to someone? Are you ever filled?  Or are you always longing for more intimacy? More control? Less vulnerability?


 Women are not inviting beings.  We are guarded. Most of our energy is spent tryng to hide our true selves and control our worlds to have some sense of security.


Women dominate and control because they fear their vulnerability.  Far from God, this way of life seems perfectly reasonable. However, we must see that this self-protective way of relating to others has nothing to do with real loving, and nothing to do with deeply trusting God.  It is our gut level response to a dangerous world.


This does not mean a woman cannot be strong. However, too many women forfeit their femininity in order to feel safe and in control.  Like Eve, we hide.  We hide because we are afraid.  To hide means to remain safe, to hurt less.  At least that is what we think.  And so by hiding, we take matters into our own hands.  We don't return to our God offering our broken hearts.  We hide.... Afraid that our question will never be answered.


We are notorious for finding substitutes in an attempt to fill our emptiness.  We buy ourselves nice things when we feel unappreciated.  We indulge in romance novels, gossip, women's magazines.  None of these things really satisfy.  They are simply what we give our hearts away to instead of giving them to the heart of God.


Why cant we see.....?


"God has not deserted us in our bondage?"  (Ezra 9:9)


Rather than turning back to God, we continue down this path of destruction by doing what we can to secure ourselves in a dangerous and unpredictable world.


And our question still remains.




Unanswered.




Or at least we think it is.

I want to be beautiful

And make you stand in awe

Look inside my heart

And be amazed

I want to hear you say

Who I am is quite enough

I just want to be worthy of love

And beautiful.

- Bethany Dillon, "Beautiful