Lord Jesus, what do You want to say to me about the way You love Yourself and the way You want me to love myself?
My darling, how I love you! I love you, I love you, I love you, and I forgive you, I forgive you, I forgive you, and it is because I love you and want to protect you from ever being abused by anyone, including yourself, that I am holding you accountable and correcting you whenever you are unkind to yourself.
Darling, your pastor said today that I give you “Easter Clothes” found in Colossians 3:12-13:
“Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.”
And darling, I want you to wear these “Easter Clothes” about yourself. I want you to have a compassionate heart, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, towards yourself, bear with yourself, and if necessary, forgive yourself.
My sweet, you can remember people who did not wear these clothes, who did not care about these clothes of kindness as much as their physical beautification or who simply did not know about them, and you remember how much such people hurt you.
On the other hand, when someone is wearing these attributes as consistently as they wear clothing, you feel safe around them. You know that when you approach them, you move closer to a shield of patience and mercy and forgiveness and gentleness. You know that if you spill something or mess up in some way, they will respond to you through that layer of merciful “clothes.”
I want you to be like that towards others, which you often or even usually are, but I also want you to be like that towards yourself.
I am giving you an Easter dress–that is, clothing that is available to you because I rose from the dead. Your Easter Dress made of these things. It’s made of a compassionate heart, embroidered with kindness flowers and humility leaves, trimmed with patience lace and meekness trim, and tied on with a sash of, on one hand, forbearance with mistakes and on the other hand, forgiveness of sins, tied together in one beautiful bow. And I want you to wear it always, so that no matter what startles you, you will respond in your dress, you will respond in kindness to yourself.
I want to train you to respond with kindness towards yourself in all situations because there is nothing that could happen on this earth that is an excuse for being unkind to Elizabeth. There is nothing she could ever do that would make that OK. I expect you to be kind to yourself no matter what situation you are in, what mistake you have made, or even what sin you have committed. If you sin, I want you to repent, not judge yourself, and if you don’t sin, I want you to show yourself pure mercy and compassion and trust Me to help you make it right. I am taking care of you.
It is pride to believe you are important enough for your mistakes to be the end of the world. Even Adam and Eve’s mistake was not the end of the world because of Me, and how much less are yours? Humility is seeing yourself as small. You are a small child to Me, well cared for, and not big enough to ruin anything. You are safe.
If you mess up, the only thing you are accountable for is to, as always, trust and obey. Trust by running to Me for help and trusting Me to rescue you and obey Me by being kind to yourself, treating yourself with all the “Easter Dress” things: compassionate heart, humility, meekness, kindness, patience, forbearance, and forgiveness.
I want you to be a safe person for yourself. I want you to be a safe place for yourself. I can’t separate you from yourself the way I can rescue you from other abusive and unkind people, I can only train you to obey Me about this.
I do not control people and so I cannot promise you that no one will ever be unkind to you–I have given them the freedom to do that–but I can promise you that no one will ever be unkind to you without consequences. I will defend you, My “chosen and beloved,” even from yourself. You don’t need to be afraid of yourself anymore. I will defend you from her. I promise.
So wear your “Easter Dress”, today and every day. Be clothed with compassion towards yourself and others, for I am risen from the dead and I am Lord.
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