DISTORTED SELF-CONCEPT.

Myles Munroe wrote in his book 'Understanding Your Potential' , "Satan distorted man’s self-concept—his esteem for the beautiful creation God made him to be."

As I was reading this in the fourth chapter of his book, a lot came to me in memory and revelation. He explains how the fall of man in the book of Genesis in the Bible, caused man to become physically/sensually aware of things.

Then the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked;...Genesis 3:7

That made man begin to live from the outside(physical) rather than from the inside(spiritual). And ever since that day, we have become 'professional cover-ups', just like how Adam and Eve felt the need to cover up their shame and fear in being naked. 

I have a number of instances when I've tried to be a cover-up in my life, or actually succeeded...do you?

I remembered how when I was younger my mum bought my sister and me each a pair of trousers. My sister got a brown one, and I got a black one. As young children between the ages of 6 and 10 if I estimate, it was very normal to see us wearing matching clothes at the same time( I still wonder how I felt comfortable and small wonder most people called us twins, hihihi). 

We had hardly stepped outside the front door to our apartment when the house manager to one of our neighbours living on the top floor from us trod by, stopping along her tracks to admire. She asked why my sister got the brown coloured pants yet she's already brown and why I got the black one yet I'm darker. In her opinion, we should have switched the pants based on how they suited our complections. 

Maybe her observation was sincere, but what it looked like to me was me realising, for the first time, that I'm darker than my sister. As a quiet child, I never voiced my thoughts on that for years and years. But what a simple statement like that gathered, built and bottled up inside me unravelled to be a terrible and monstrous lie from the father of  lies (John 8:44).

I can't begin to express it all without delving into other stories themselves within the bigger story. 

Ever since that day, we have become professional “cover-ups.” We don’t like ourselves. We don’t like our physical bodies. Yuk! I don’t like how skinny I am…how fat I am…how my hair grows…how my eyes are…how my lips are. I don’t like my black, brown, red, yellow, or white skin. So we try to cover up what we don’t like. It is strange how we work on things. If our hair is curly, we straighten it. If our skin is too pale, we get a tan. We don’t like what we are. Nobody is satisfied with themselves. We all walk around saying, “Why do you want to be like me? I want to be like you.” 

This attitude is from the devil. We can’t just be ourselves because satan has destroyed our appreciation of what God made. Our potential has been distorted so that we don’t want to be black or tall or fat. We don’t want to have curly hair or fat lips or small eyes. We have accepted satan’s ploy to destroy our esteem for the beautiful creation God made us to be.  (Borrowed from: Understanding Your Potential by Myles Munroe pg.53).

I'd be lying if I said I'm not still on this journey of freedom from the deceptions of the enemy that are preventing me from seeing even myself through God's eyes, knowing His thoughts about me and walking in the fullness of who He says I am. 

I'd also be lying if I said I don't believe even for a second that at least one of the people who will ever read this is in a similar spot to mine. 

I was having a conversation with a friend, and she led me to Psalm 139:16,

Your eyes saw my unformed body;all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be (NIV).

I pray in the name of Jesus that you, the reader, whenever you'll read this in time to know with deep understanding and great persuasion beyond doubt like Paul (Romans 8:38), that what Jesus says in John 10:10 about Him coming that we may have life and have it in abundance is true for us as believers in Christ Jesus. And that He indeed came to destroy and undo the works of the devil as it is written in 1 John 3:8. Now to Him who is able to deliver us and keep us I pray, amen.

Maybe we'll continue this conversation at another time by the grace and mercies of our good Lord, the one and only true God according to His will. But until then :),

Jesus loves you beautiful child of God.

love Serene Steph.