The Untaming of the Shrew

When I first made the decision to give my life to Christ, I had no idea what I was in for. An inexplicable amount of peace and joy overpowered me. I was completely on fire for the Lord and became highkey obsessed. In the past, I always used my getting-ready time to catch up on beauty or celebrity gossip videos on Youtube. But all of a sudden, I was using that time to listen to the audio Bible or watch a sermon. There was literally nothing else I was interested in. And for the most part, with the exception of certain short-lived moments of fake despair from me not getting my way, that hasn’t really changed.

Now don’t get me wrong, the amount of learning and intimacy I’ve gained over these past few years have been nothing short of a blessing. But what I want to dive into is something else with this post. It’s the borderline psychotic breakdown that happens when a baby Christian is trying to play catch up and worries way too much about what people think.

This is the story of how I nearly lost my mind…

One morning as I was getting ready, I had a Youtube video of a Christian content creator playing in the background. She had a powerful story and I decided to leave a comment expressing how much I enjoyed what she shared. But after a quick gaze at the already existing comments, I realized that not everyone was on the same page. Her comments were flooded with criticism over the amount of makeup she was wearing, how she was dressed, and accusations of her carrying the Jezebel spirit. I was confused because not once while listening to her testimony did I question her character because of how she looked. I mean, she looked GOOD. What was the problem?

This ended up being the first of many other similar situations that I would come across. I started noticing that during sermons centered around purity, a woman’s clothing and her intentions behind it was always brought up. Christian women who were attractive would be getting bullied in their comments and seen as disingenuous or needing to be tamed. This created anxiety and insecurity in me that I had never experienced before. I enjoyed having my hair done and wearing cute clothes. I enjoyed beating my face, even if it was just for the grocery store. I also have a naturally curvy body. There’s no malice behind it, it just is what it is. But seeing how many people might have an issue with things about me that I couldn’t change brainwashed me into thinking that in order to be following the Lord, I had to all of a sudden start looking like who shot John. 

It came to a point where every time I put on clothes, I would have a meltdown. Outfits that I normally wouldn’t have given a second thought made me extra self-conscious. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m at a stage right now where I definitely try to be more intentional about how much I show. I feel like that just naturally comes with getting older and not wanting to be harassed in these streets. But I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about how one time I was in Forever 21 shopping for an outfit for a New Year’s Eve party I was invited to and sitting on the dressing room floor crying my eyes out when I saw that the golden-yellow blouse I wanted looked more “revealing” on me than it did the mannequin I saw it on originally. I knew it would be all church people there and my mind went spiraling. I texted one of my brothers in Christ to explain the dilemma I was having. He responded with “I mean, it’s your body. God gave it to you”. That made me feel better enough to buy the top. Before the party, I paired it with jeans and a sheer undershirt so my girlies wouldn’t be falling out and I thought I was all good to go. Only to find out the next day from that same brother in Christ that one of the men there was making comments about what I was wearing and implying that I went to the party with intentions of trying to leave with a man and questioning if I had any body work done. 

My mental state was already going downhill at that point, but this was just too much. I started ordering clothes 2 sizes too big. I started to have false convictions about doing my hair and makeup. I even asked myself if I was wrong for having my nose pierced. A verse people would often use to justify calling women out for wanting to look a certain way is 1 Peter 3:3-4:

Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear.

The constant quoting of scripture without any context has tricked a lot of women into thinking that God can’t use them unless they’re dressed like a Santera, head wrap and all. 

However, God placed me in a season of isolation where He taught me many things, one of them being that this was never what He meant by that verse.

Last summer was one of the most transformative periods for me because I had spent the majority of my time alone. My closest friends were out of state, I was no longer in a relationship, and I wasn’t being included in a lot of spaces like I was before. Having that much time to myself presented me with an opportunity to gain that fire that had somewhat been dimmed over time. It was during this time that I realized I made other people’s opinions an idol. So much so that I cared more about how others looked at me than I did about who God says I am. 

After coming to Christ, I dumbed down a lot of my personality because I thought that was what I was supposed to do. I wanted to make sure that no one could have anything negative to say about me, which in reality would never be the case. The above verses were about making the way you look your God. I had replaced that ideology with impressing people who don’t even have any concern over my well-being. It was ridiculous. 

For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.

Galatians 1:10

He was intentional with how He made me, and that includes my quirks, my clownery, and even how I prefer to dress. What matters is that I’m using all that He has given me in an edifying way. And while I’m not perfect at it, I’m trying. I stay in my word daily and try to apply it to my life and how I treat others. I attempt to prioritize His ways over my own. I’ve died to myself in many other ways as well. Has dressing appropriate to weather conditions and wearing a dangly nose ring ever hindered me from that? No. But caring about human opinions sure has. Let’s not even get into how most of these opinions are only geared toward women and Christian men are able to wear hoochie daddy shorts and flaunt their nipples all over my timeline and no one bats an eye. So it’s a wrap on that.

The truth is it as long as your intentions are in check, it shouldn’t  matter how you look. How’s your heart? What’s your fruit looking like? There will always be people with something bad to say and 9 times out of 10, if they have the time to spend criticizing you based on frivolous things, they lack an understanding of who Christ really is. 

So don’t be held hostage by the fear of displeasing others. Only His opinion matters.