How long has it been since your last haircut?

After getting tired of the hearing people talk endlessly about their split ends during the COVID-19 pandemic, I decided to do something about my own split ends. I thought my hair was in decent condition, because of how well I care for it. I was wrong.

We Do Not Know Ourselves As God Knows Us

I sat down with a tiny scissors and gathered my hair, searching for split ends to trim. At first, I didn’t see any, but holding my hair up to the light, I saw them and trimmed until I had a little pile. 

The next day, sitting at my desk, I saw one split end I’d missed, then another. If you’ve never trimmed spilt ends, you have no idea how addictive it is. Once you think, “That’s it, I’ve trimmed every last one,” and sweep them into the trash, you find ten more.

After this continued for a few days, I felt a little ridiculous. But I also realized something. I don’t know myself very well.

I almost cried as I thought of Luke 12:7, “Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.”

I don’t know the number of hairs on my head; I didn’t even know how bad my split ends were. But God knew. 

Even the most loving mother doesn’t know the hair on our heads.

No one knows us as God knows us. 

If he knows the number of hairs on our heads, He also can see each scar upon our skin, each tear, each time we wonder if we’ll ever be worthy of love.

Hiding Yourself Away

Dear girl, do you ever grow weary of yourself? Do you fear if anyone saw your dark and secret sins, you’d be rejected?

Are there parts of you-personality, body, quirks, or scars, parts that aren’t sinful but still feel disjointed and wrong somehow? Do you fear to show them, to be yourself, the you God meant you to be? Do you hide any sign of brokenness?

Do you fear that if anyone fully knew you, you could not be loved?

A Wilting Rose

Wilted roses aren’t roses in glorious bloom. Something damaged them. Do you wonder if you’ll ever feel whole again?

When did you begin to believe you were wilted?

Did you give into sin? Did you reject the sweet love of your Father for something you knew wouldn’t last? 

Have you listened to the lies of the devil so long you’ve forgotten how His voice even sounds?

Were you mistreated or even abused? Did illness strip you down until you began to believe you were worthless?

Do you wonder if you will ever be worthy of love?

I sometimes wonder if we secretly wish someone would answer our tortured doubts by saying, “God doesn’t love you anyway. Just stop hoping.”

Dear wilting Rose, that voice trying to persuade you you’re wounded beyond God’s repair-it’s all a lie. 

Scripture says “a bruised reed He will not break.” (Isaiah 42:3) He sees each bruise on your heart, and He holds you tenderly.

Just because you feel wilted doesn’t mean you’re worthless. It doesn’t even mean you are wilted. Because maybe, the feeling of brokenness is just a leftover ghost, a phantom pain of the curse. Maybe we will feel it all the while we wander here. But there is something you need to know.

God Knows, Values, and Loves You

If you secretly fear that if you were fully known, you’d be fully despised, remember this: God knows you fully, and He still extends His overflowing heart of love and grace. He wants to heal your heart and shape it anew. He values you, even when you cannot seem to value yourself.

Listen to Jesus’ words: “Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.” (Luke 12:6-7)

A Value Placed Upon You

I once was utterly shattered when I realized that God could lay any price on redemption. He could have made the payment of our sin-debt a year of hard labor. Instead, He chose to make it cost the most valuable thing ever to exist: Jesus Christ. This means two things: sin is that grave. Only God’s Son could withstand the weight of God’s grief and wrath at our sin. That was how much it took to pay our debt! And when we think that if we choose to reject His gift, we will spend forever tormented by our hatred of God and of ourselves, we also realize how weighty our sin is.

But it also means something else: God valued us at the price of His Son’s death! How many people would willingly send their son into sure and certain death? By choosing to value the cost of our redemption at Jesus’ death, He valued us at the highest possible value.

All We Can Do Is Say Yes

“But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8

Of course we don’t deserve God’s love‒we can’t ever do anything to earn the cross. But we don’t have to earn it or deserve the wild price of our redemption.

In the face of this love, all we can do is say, “Yes, Jesus. I believe You love me. You know every hair on my head. You’ve seen each foul sin. You mourned when I turned away from You. You even cried with me when I crumpled in the darkened closet, crying because I thought I was unlovable.

I don’t deserve Your love, but I don’t have to deserve it to accept it. Please take this frail heart and shape it as You will. I trust You and I love you, Lord.”

Do You Believe That He Loves You?

Dear girl, do you feel wilted? Do you see the split ends of your soul and want to hide them away?

Pray. Pray that God will help you truly believe that He loves you. Run to the One who knows you fully, and still, He loved you and gave Himself up for you.

“I am now utterly convinced that on Judgement Day, the Lord Jesus is going to ask each of us one question and one question only. Did you believe that I loved you?” ~Brennan Manning