Coffee for your Heart: You Are Loved

Today is another day I link up with Holley Gerth over at Coffee for your Heart. (www.holleygerth.com). And The above photo/quote is how I want you to feel as you read through my blog: like we are 2 friends, having a cup of coffee. Because if I had all the time in the world (and wasn't busy making coffee for everyone) I'd love to be sitting with you, having a cup of your favorite blend and chatting. 

   It's early morning, and I am just out of bed, hair messy, eyes baggy, and moving slowly,but quite content as I sip on my cup of coffee.

 Please….grab your cup and join me. 

  Today I want to tell you that You Are Loved. 

Not for what you do as a career.

  Not for what awards you have won.

    Not for what ladder you may be climbing.

        Not for your looks. 

Plain and simple: You Are Loved.

      In spite of your past mistakes.

          With disregard to any future movements. 

              No matter what pant size. 

                   All scars shown bare….

You Are Loved. 

         There is nothing you have to do to earn the love of Jesus. He offers it freely. He wants you to have it. He longs for you to know it and hold onto it with every breath. 

  If you strip every thing you own and all you feel you have become, He loves you for who you are. 

I am a people pleaser, and when anyone is upset with me, I tend to worry about being unloved (or unliked). This has  often caused me insecurities but it has been a huge lesson God has been teaching me over the last year, and I hope you can hear my heart as I pour it out here. 

  We mess up….but God extends Grace.

     We sometimes put on fake smiles….but God sees the depths of our hearts and feels compassion for our biggest hurts, fears, dreams and desires. 

  We are human, there truly is no "perfect" size, no matter what the magazines say…because God created us in His image and finds us beautiful simply because He made us, each one of us, unique.

 We strive to achieve…..but Jesus says "Come Just as You are" 

     Why? 

 Because You Are Loved. 

  He says "Child….I love you!"
   I don't have to earn it.
        I don't have to try to be the "people pleaser" that  I am with Jesus- He loves me as I am for who I am.

So stop and think about that the next time you want to beat yourself up over a hurtful word or a past mistake or what the scale may say or what you may have allowed yourself to believe for many years.
   You Are Loved.

I'm preaching to the choir here….as much as I want you to hear this and know this, this is just as much a reminder for my own heart today.
    Embrace it. One Day at A Time.