What does being loved look like?

We all want to be loved. Women especially long for someone to love them, hold them tight and never let them go but that is just romantic love and REAL love is so much more. So what does being loved really look like? The answer surprised me…

Recently, the congregants at my church read the extremely short book: One Word That Will Change Your Life by Jon Gordon, Dan Britton and Jimmy Page. The point of the book is that instead of New Year’s resolutions that none of us really keep, what about asking God to give you a word to direct you for 365 days that applies to what they refer to as the dimensions of our lives: spiritual, physical, mental, relational, emotional, and financial. I read the book.

I read it New Year’s Day. It suggests finding a quiet place.  I did not.  It suggests being alone.  I was not. Still, I read. God is a BIG God. My thought, if He wants to give me a word today, He can speak over the noise. He did. Immediately, I wanted Him to take it back.

About three years ago, I read Captivating by Stasi & John Eldridge. Took me for freaking ever. Truths, that were hard on my mind and heart caused me to take well over a month to read a book that normally would take a few days. In the book, they encourage you to find the meaning in your name as a segway to discovering God’s pet name for you. I walked the process out and when He told me what His name for me was…I told Him, emphatically, NO. But He very much enjoys beating me in the head with His love until I surrender to its truth.

My name was Beautiful. If you know me, you know that I am loud, crude, funny: maybe, chubby: definitely, loving, giving, stubborn: for sure but beautiful…not so much. My testimony and life for are chuck full of yucky stuff. Hard stuff. Ugly stuff.  Good stuff too! Don’t get me wrong. Redemption and healing abound. It’s just people don’t look at me and think: there’s Tiffany! Isn’t she beautiful? Or at least from my perspective they don’t. God spent 90 days knocking me over with a feather and hitting me hard over the head with a stick until finally, I accepted that inside I was beautiful. Did I mention I was stubborn?

So, I am laying in my bed asking for my word and I am like, hey God? Need that word, buddy.  What about it? And don’t say beautiful! He says clearly…what do you always feel and without hesitation, I say alone. He said, Beautiful, you are the opposite of that and THAT is YOUR word. Smart ass me says, I don’t want “chosen” as a word, man.  He says to me that’s great because chosen isn’t your word. Look up alone in the thesaurus. First word that jumps off the page is LOVED. I am like, oh hell no! And He is like, oh heavens yes! And once again, I cried.

I won’t go into all the details here of why I fail to feel loved but let’s agree that we as humans like to collect and save all the bad things people who are supposed to love us speak into and over us. While I know a few people who love me; I don’t live in a state of feeling loved. Duh, alone was the first word to my mind, right? We hold tighter to the lies of the roaming lion seeking to destroy us than we do to the words of the very ONE who CREATED us…and in His own image, no less.

With a SIGH and a whatever God which included a strong eye roll, I grabbed my pen and notebook and started to journal, steering away from anything strictly romantic.

LOVED:

Opposite of alone

Liked very much

To find pleasure in

Desired

Adored

Precious (please tell me you hear Gollum too?)

Held dear

Admired

Treasured

Strong affection for another rising out of kinship or a personal tie

Affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests

Warm attachment

Devotion

Tenderness

Unselfish, loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another

All that and this verse: You love me so much and you placed your greatness upon me. You rescued me from the deepest darkness and you have delivered me from certain death (Psalm 86:13).

Though much of that tugged at my heart, I was still calling bullshit. So, I spoke to a friend who is a counselor and asked what does being loved look like? This man used to be a minister and he laughed, saying not what you might think because as we become mature in our faith, we are called to be more and more like Christ. Christ, who was bruised, scorned, beaten, rejected and crucified for LOVE. And yet, we expect somehow that our transformations into becoming more like Him means, we will escape the torture that turned Him from man back into God’s perfection, His son.

I am sitting stunned, mouth almost agape…already knowing the complete truth and impact of his statement having already come myself to a deeper understanding of God’s Love over the past 5-7 years. By His stripes we are healed. By our stripes, another behind us is healed. Once again, I am overwhelmed by both the beauty of God’s construct and the absolute absurdity of it. His ways are not our ways and they are higher (Isaiah 55:8). One of these days, I suspect that will somehow, really, FINALLY sink into the depth of my bones; so I don’t have to keep being reminded.

I am beautiful. I am loved. It doesn’t matter what my eyes see. It does not matter what my heart feels. It doesn’t matter my circumstances. It only matters what He says I am.  What the I AM says I am is the ONLY truth that is ALWAYS true. I am human and eventually, will disappoint you, fail you, hurt you BUT HE is GOD and He NEVER leaves you alone…only LOVED.