Taking off the good girl mask

When I was a little girl I learned about what was right and wrong. In my mind it was perfectly black and white and I intended to be on the right side of it all. In church I learned that Christian girls don't swear, drink, smoke, and they don't have sex until they're married. Those were the golden rules of being a good Christian girl. If you don't follow those rules, you are morally impure and have highly questionable faith. However, if you do follow those rules, you're the golden child. The model of the modern Christian teen. 

So, I took that all to heart and tried my best to follow all the rules and guidelines to succeed as a good girl. On the outside, teenage Laura was a perfect good girl. I didn't go to parties, I didn't fraternize with the "bad" kids. I was very involved in my church. I went on mission trips and I lead bible studies. I built walls of "righteousness" around me to reflect my "goodness", while inside those walls there was a broken, messy girl. Church taught me to follow rules and play a certain part, not to be honest about my struggles. Heaven forbid a "good Christian girl" have real problems.

However, the whole time I was emulating the good girl image, I wasn't a good girl at all. The difference was, instead of being transparent about my bad girl parts, I just hid them and kept them a secret. I didn't want my Christian peers to see me as the "bad girl". It's much easier to play the part and lock away the "badness" within. 

Here's the enormous problem with that idea. That is the opposite of Christian living. Being a Christian is 0% about following rules. The whole point of Christianity is that we receive love and grace without having to do anything. God pours out his love on us not because of what we do, but simply because he loves us. He loves me, good girl parts and bad girl parts combined. And by putting on a mask of fake "goodness", I diminished the power of that love. Truthfully, I am an imperfect person loved by a perfect God. 

I always have been. By wearing a good girl mask, I was even more of a sinner than without it. Being dishonest about where you're at and what kind of person you are is problematic for two reasons. Firstly, you're not being a genuine person. And secondly, you're being a terrible witness to people around you by pretending Christianity is about following certain rules. People focus so much on outside behaviours and not enough on what's going on inside. The Bible says that men judge by what they see but God judges your heart. So what's going on inside, the things that are unseen, are of primary importance. 

In Matthew 23:25-26 Jesus uses a metaphor of dirty dishes to illustrate this problem. "You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean." 

Being clean and pretty and "good" on the outside means absolutely nothing. God cares way more about what's going on inside your heart. You focus on that stuff first and then the outside will clean itself.

It's stupid to wear a mask. It's not what Christianity is about and it's not helpful to anyone. You're not a good girl or a good boy so cut the crap. We all have some bad girl-ness and bad boy-ness inside. That's just a part of being human. And you know what? God's ok with that. You think he doesn't know that perfection isn't a human option? Yeah right. You think he did the whole crucifixion thing just for fun? Hardly.

Stop playing the part Christian culture has told you to play, and start playing the part of YOU. Because God doesn't love your mask, he loves YOU. Good parts and bad. 

I've taken off my mask and burned it. I'm a bad girl Christian and that's ok. 

Being a Christian hasn't made me "good", it's made me forgiven and it's made me free. Free to love myself, even though I'm a bad girl, because God loves me.