Jesus Already Forgave Our Sins; But Have We Forgiven Ourselves?

When I was younger I struggled a lot with my own personal self image. When I was really young I was always the chunky kid. Birthday parties weren’t too hard but Summer birthdays were the worst by far because if you were having a Summer birthday, chances are it was a pool party. I hated taking my shirt off for fear of people making fun of me. My classmate had already dubbed me “Chubby Cheeks” and sometimes came with some endearment. Many times at pool parties I would just keep my shirt on. I could have done a rash guard but that just vacuumed sealed my belly and man-boobies. Me and a couple other kids; since we were usually the more chunky ones, we kind of hung out together and we gave each other confidence that wearing a shirt in the pool wasn’t that big of a deal even though many of the other kids thought it was funny. Good luck trying to talk to the girl you had a crush on!

There in the summer of 7th to 8th grade year in jr. high school I grew over 3 1/2 inches and I came back in eighth grade this tall string-bean kid; people didn’t even recognize me because I changed so much in just one summer.

All of a sudden I was noticed by the kids that were the popular ones started talking to me a little bit more. They started asking me to come play with them more-often during lunchtime, and I got invited to kids birthday parties that I never had before.

And then I did something I never thought I could ever do, I became like one of the “cool kids” I swore I would never become. I wanted to spend more time with other cool kids and spend less time with my real friends I had because we were the beat-neck/weird kids who came from lower income neighborhoods. We weren’t the kids who went on vacation all the time. We didn’t have a motor-home or sand rails or dune-buggies. We were usually the kids that were the first ones dropped off at morning daycare in the morning and the last ones to leave at afternoon daycare because our parent were working crazy hours to pay for us to go to private school. Being a poor fat kid at a private Christian school is like showing up to a fitness convention (back when it wasn’t against the law to have more than 3 people in a room without masks) with a two-dozen Sprinkles Cupcakes. It’s just awkward. You know it and they know it.

Now, as I’m in my 30’s, I’m no longer at my heaviest and I’m getting back down to a more stable level around 200, but I’ve always this terrible sense of self-image because my weight had always fluctuated.
One of the things I’ve been talking about with my therapist is the idea of being able to forgive myself for things I’ve done in my past and forgive other for what they had done to me, even-though, they probably never knew how it affected me. As a follower of Jesus Christ I know He has forgiven me, I have worked to forgive others, but I had not yet forgiven myself nor had I really spoken to myself in a kind or encouraging way prior to about 3 years ago. I had never really practiced forgiveness because I was a vengeful person when I was young.

As the old saying goes, if you are a baseball player, you probably have a chip on your shoulder. Most athletes, I think, are wired this way. We have something to prove to ourselves or to those who didn’t think we would be good enough. It’s not necessarily by choice, but likely because of circumstances in our young lives that causes part of our life to be misshapen.

I never knew what true forgiveness looked like for most of my life. Even now, I’m barely scratching the surface of understanding forgiveness. I never realized how vital forgiveness was to my personal well-being and mental-health because nobody had really shown me what it was. I’m glad to say that I’m growing more confident in myself because of forgiving others and most of all, forgiveness of self, which has helped me grow. It has helped me develop a more healthy self-image due to the Holy Spirit giving me insight into the value He saw in me, but that I couldn’t yet see in myself. Something often spoken of is that God forgives us through Jesus’ death of the Cross. It’s yet another thing to forgive ourselves when we realize the true weight of our sin.

After 32 years, I am finally growing truly comfortable in who I am. I am a unique vessel created by the Holy Spirit being used for God’s purpose. I believe that purpose is to reach people that most consider to be unreachable.

God crafted you and I to His exact specifications and purpose. It’s time we understood this and began utilizing our skills for God’s calling in our life.