Today’s Daily Bread: Disordered

Isaiah 45:11-12 – This is what the LORD, the Creator and Holy One of Israel, says:  “Do you question what I do?  Do you give me orders about the work of my hands?  I am the One who made the earth and created people to live on it.  With my hands I stretched out the heavens.  All the millions of stars are at my command.”

My struggle with self-image started in 9^th grade.  I had always been painfully skinny – nothing but elbows and knees.  I had also always been able to eat like nobody’s business.  Pizza, chips, doughnuts, you name it.  Around 8^th grade, I started to fill out a little bit.  I can remember looking at myself in the mirror as I got ready to hit the beach with some friends the summer before my sophomore year, and I was shocked to see a pooch on my tummy.  My arms weren’t quite as skinny as they’d always been, and my thighs seemed to jiggle when I walked. 

Those weren’t my only flaws, according to my young mind.  My nose was at least two sizes too big for my face, and I couldn’t stand my feet.  I had inherited my mother’s long fingers and toes, and I loathed wearing sandals or going barefoot.

I remember the first time I experimented with bulimia.  I was 14 years old, and we were getting ready to move to Highlands Ranch, Colorado.  My mom had taken us to McDonalds for dinner, and I felt stuffed and bloated from eating too much.  I had read magazine articles about models that ate and threw up in order to lose weight.  “Why not,” I thought.

That was the beginning of a 17 year battle with weight, self-esteem, and control.

It has taken years for me to get to a place where I feel comfortable discussing it.  I never wanted to take up that cause.  I never wanted to be the poster child for eating-disorder awareness.  However, I have to wonder if my Father has other plans.

God has recently placed at least seven people in my path who have either shared my struggles or are fighting them as we speak, not mention the countless other women in my life who suffer from self-loathing.  Here are some sobering statistics:

• 1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder or disordered eating (National Institute of Mental Health)
• Eating Disorders affect up to 24 million Americans and 70 million individuals worldwide (The Renfrew Center Foundation for Eating Disorders)
• 90 % of those who have eating disorders are women between the ages of 12 and 25 (SAMHSA)
• It is estimated that currently 11% of high school students have been diagnosed with an eating disorder (ANAD)
• While women are more commonly affected by eating disorders, more than a million men and boys battle the illness every day (www.nationaleatingdisorders.org)
• 91 % of women surveyed on a college campus had attempted to control their weight through dieting, 22% dieted “often” or “always” (Kurth, Krahn, Nairn, Drewnowski, 1995)

Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness, and anorexic individuals have a 12% higher likelihood of dying than non-anorexic individuals.

A woman I know in the entertainment industry is involved in these same struggles.  “I’m just not built skinny.  And I feel like I’m too stocky to be a dancer,” she recently confided.  She doesn’t think her face is cute enough to be a performer.  And yet God has so clearly gifted her with the ability to dance.  Her voice would take your breath away.

To her and anyone else struggling with their self-image I would like to say this, as loudly as I can:  GOD DID NOT MESS UP ON YOU.

Isaiah 45:4-6 – “And why have I called you for this work?  It is for the sake of Jacob my servant, Israel my chosen one.  I called you by name when you did not know me.  I am the LORD; there is no other God.  I have prepared you, even though you do not know me, so all the world from east to west will know there is no other God(emphasis mine).”

The vast majority of self-image issues are wrapped around a number on the scale.  I have been underweight, overweight and a healthy weight.  Allow me to share my observations: When you get to the number you desire, you will find something else about yourself to obsess about.  It’s how the enemy works.  “Weigh this, and you’ll be perfect.  Make this much, and you’ll be happy.  Own this, and you’ll be content.  Achieve this, and you’ll have peace.”  But the devil’s promises don’t deliver.  The problem lies in expecting anything other than the saving grace of Jesus Christ to bring wholeness.

My nose is bigger than I would like it to be.  If I had my way, I would’ve given myself a more pronounced chin, knees that weren’t quite so knobby, and toes that didn’t look quite so much like fingers.  But I can also look at myself and know that I am exactly the way God created me.  God did not make a mistake.  He counts the hairs on my head and the freckles on my face.  He carefully crafted every detail, mapping out my very DNA as He knit me together in the womb.  I will not allow myself to get caught up in the ever-losing battle of trying to meet the world’s expectations of beauty.  Rather, I will attempt to shine His light so brightly that He is all they see.  He gave me hands to do His work and a voice to proclaim His message.  Ears to hear His whispers and a heart to love as He loves.

You are perfect and beautiful in His sight.  You have been uniquely gifted and created to do a job that only you can do.  You make a difference.  He thought of you before the world began and smiled.  You are adopted into His family and accepted just the way you are.  You have been chosen, forgiven and redeemed.  In all of history, there has never been another made exactly the way He made YOU, and there never will be again.  Praise God for His marvelous craftsmanship!

Dear Heavenly Father, the enemy has so many of your children in bondage over their self-esteem.  God, help us not to rely on SELF esteem to feel good about ourselves, but rather YOUR esteem.  While our weight may change, Your love for us never will.  Our faces age, but You have always been and always will be.  Forgive us for spending more time worrying about ourselves and what others think about us than we do in Your Presence.  Lord, please help us to recognize the schemes of the enemy.  Help us to remember that when we are obsessing over worldly things, we are rendered ineffective for Your Kingdom.  The world’s definition of beauty is warped, and unattainable.  Magazine covers are retouched airbrushed.  The notion that we need a surgeon’s assistance to look our best is absurd.  Help us to call this out!  Help us to rejoice in the way You created us!  Touch our eyes, that we might see beauty the way You do.  Touch our hearts, that we might love everything You created, including ourselves.  We love You, Father, and we thank You in advance for breaking these chains.  It is in the magnificent name of Jesus Christ that we pray.  Amen.