Your Fat Is Beautiful

My husband loves his motorcycle and I love to join him on the back and fly around our picturesque country roads.

The freedom of getting out of the house and enjoying the beauty of God’s creation always gives me a sense that all is right in my world. As I sit behind my husband, I often find myself smiling and worshiping God as we point out the beautiful sights we discover in our area. I talk to God and thank Him for His goodness to us.

One day while we roamed the countryside I heard a very quick and clear sentence from God that messed me up a lot. I was wearing a black tank top covered by a black button down shirt and the wind had pulled the shirt back to reveal my tank-covered tummy.

When I looked down, I grimaced at the ugly rolls of belly fat that I saw. I immediately “heard” God say to me,

“Your fat is beautiful.”

What? Let me just say, that even a husband knows never to say such a thing to his wife. A careful husband might say, “I love the way you look” or “You are perfect just the way you are” or any number of similar versions that will keep him out of trouble and still be close to honest. But a smart man will never say what God had just said to me!

God told me that my fat is beautiful. What in the world do I do with this information? Many of my friends are hearing God talk to them. He is telling them how to transform a nation. He is giving them vision plans for feeding the poor, and helping them create strategies that will stop the sex slave industry.

My God tells me that my fat is beautiful.

I still do not know why God gave me such an odd message. It did not get shared to our church the following Sunday, that’s for sure. It was our little secret. But this shocking sentence reminded me once again that God is very different from us. His view and His values are galaxies away from mine. You know that verse about how God’s thoughts are not our thoughts? So true!

(Matthew 16:23 But Jesus turned and told Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are an offense to me, because you are not thinking God’s thoughts but human thoughts!” ISV) God has a completely different measuring tape for life.

My God who loves me, even adores me, looks at me and sees beauty. He does not see the failure or the fat that is so obvious to me. He also does not equate fat with failure, as I do. I cannot help but compare myself to society’s beauty standard. Which is pretty silly because recently, even society is recognizing how unrealistically Hollywood and the modeling world has portrayed women and their bodies.

My wonderful God is messing up my mind with little sentences like this. Words that are revealing who He is. He is giving me little clues about His character and His ways. I do not understand the concept of calling rolls of fat beautiful. I also cannot say that I agree with Him on this just yet. Let’s say that we are working on this one together.

But I can try to stop frowning at myself so much. I can stop grumbling at the parts of my body that do not measure up to society’s odd standards. My words to myself need to match His. My self-talk needs to be full of kindness and as much grace as I offer to others so freely. If I have asked God to live in me, to live in my mind, my heart and my body, then frowning at the mirror is not something I want to be doing is it?

Dear friend, look at yourself. Look at your body, your face and hair. Do you release a sigh of frustration? Maybe you don’t. We all have the “good” days and the “ugly” days. I can love my hair one day and hate it the next.

Embrace who you are in your body today. God loves you and your belly. His love is pure. It is beyond our imagination. God’s love for you is so complete that He does let out a sigh when He looks at you. But it is not a sigh of sadness or disgust. It is a sigh of adoration and enchantment. He smiles at every thought of you and that is more thoughts than the grains of sand on all the beaches in the world.

Thank you Father for loving my fat. I do not understand it, but I accept it and will try to embrace this body you have given me. You live in me, so how could I be mean or cruel to your dwelling place? Thank you God for my body.

Susie Klein

http://www.recoveringchurchlady.com/