I
was sitting on my bedroom floor with my knees tucked against my chest, my back
pressed against the locked door, and my tear-streaked face buried in my hands. I could feel the desperation rising up inside
of me, threatening to explode. I had to
do something to make the pain go away.
I
knew exactly what I had to do.
The
sharp edge of the silver razor glinted in the light of my bedroom lamp. I pulled up the leg of my favorite pair of
yoga pants and looked at my ankle. My
white skin seemed so pale and vulnerable.
As I pressed the razor to my flesh, crimson red blood slowly seeped out.
I
didn’t wince or make a sound. I only
gritted my teeth and forced the razor harder into my skin.
My
ankle ached with every pass of the razor, but I refused to stop. This was the only way.
It
wasn’t until there were three deep cuts etched into my skin that I wiped off
the razor, walked to my desk, and hid it beneath my pencil case in the top left
drawer. For next time, I thought,
because I knew there would be a next time.
There always was.
My four years of high school were the
hardest years of my life. I was knee-deep
in my eating disorder and I didn’t know what to do with all of the pain in my
heart. So I turned to cutting as a way
of dealing with my emotions.
“Do you not know that your bodies are temples
of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a
price. Therefore honor God with your
bodies.” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
No, I didn’t know that. I wish I had.
I thought that as long as no one else
knew what I was doing, I was the only one being hurt by cutting myself. I didn’t realize that I was also hurting God
and hurting my relationship with Him. I
didn’t even realize how deeply I was being hurt by my cutting. Or maybe I just didn’t care.
Like any other addiction, I found that
once I started I couldn’t stop. I needed
the feel of a razor pressing against my skin.
At least, I thought That was what I needed.
What
I really needed was Jesus.
“And
He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross so that we might die to sin
and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.” (1 Peter
2:24-25)
I didn’t want help. I thought that getting help meant that I
would be forced to do things I didn’t want to do…like stop cutting myself. But I couldn’t stop. I wouldn’t.
(If you think I’m stubborn now, you should have seen me in high school.) So I stubbornly refused the help that I so
desperately needed.
At 16, I didn’t understand that God’s
healing isn’t about being forced to do things you don’t want to do. It’s
about turning away from who you used to be - sinful, stubborn, broken - and
turning into the person God designed you to be.
Healed. Redeemed. Complete.
That’s what Peter meant when he wrote
about dying to sin and living to righteousness.
When Jesus died, He paid the ultimate
price so that we could live in righteousness and glorify Him. It’s not easy to turn away from everything
that used to define you. But when you
let God heal you and learn to find your identity in Him alone, it is worth it.
So what are you waiting for?
Pursue
righteousness.
Embrace
redemption.
Find
your identity.
Be
healed.
(Drew this years ago when I first got the chance to use my testimony to reach out to a young girl struggling with cutting. Not a great drawing, but it reminds me of how God uses His healing in my life to heal others as well.)
