Bless This Mess

Tonight I've been reflecting on the degree of separation I've always felt from most people.
It always had to do with the thought, "Their lives aren't anything like the mess mine is. They would never understand or accept me."
Throughout my youth, I was told by some very pivotal people in my life, that I was beyond help and not worth saving, that I should just kill myself. I've been told that I am ugly and homely and no one would ever love or want a girl like me. That no one likes people like me period. 
The more people told me these vicious lies, the more I projected it onto God. If everyone thinks this of me, why wouldn't He?!
The more cruel the world was to me, the more I hid my heart from all the people around me. To this day, there are very few people that I can say truly know me.
The farther I withdrew and the more distance I put between God and I, the more it became scarred in my heart and mind that I was truly beyond hope and beyond saving. And even if I could be saved, who would want to save a broken mess like me?
But I want to tell you something so important to me, for any heart that needs to hear this.

You are not alone in your pain.
If you were sitting in church this morning and it hurt to smile and all the songs were too short and peppy and didn't reflect your heart and your hurt, you weren't the only one.
If you are too angry and have been too broken down and sick of the hypocrites to even step into a church, I've been there too.
If you've spent your whole life running from any real relationship, because your heart just can't take getting hurt or rejected one more time; I see you.
If you have ever been told that you are anything but beautiful, worthy of love and that YOU ARE worth the fight, I'm telling you now that it's a lie from the pit of hell.
Don't you waste one more second believing that any part of you is beyond or not worth saving. 
Please believe me when I tell you, that God loves you enough to reach into the hell you are in, to pull you out.

He loves you enough to leave behind the guaranteed 99, to chase after you...his one lost sheep.
There is absolutely NOTHING you could have possibly done, that would or could make Him not love you.
There is nothing that has ever been done TO you, that made you unworthy.
You are never too far gone and there is nowhere that you can run, that Jesus won't come running after you.
We might have had some really pathetic people in our lives that didn't know how to love us and were terrible models of what we deserve.
You may have been hurt. You may have been abused. You may have been lied to and betrayed. Someone may have given up on you, when you wanted them to fight. 
I've been there on ALL counts, but tonight I rest in this truth...My God will never stop fighting for me. He will never stop coming after me. He will never stop breaking down the walls I keep trying to put up, to protect myself and there is not a moment, when He isn't willing to step into my mess and love me right where I'm at.