Be Real

I watched her Fall home tour on Instagram. She stuffed a few pillows into a basket and carefully placed a soft throw blanket on her couch. It wasn’t folded neatly, it was perfectly displayed as if someone had just gotten up from under its cozy, warm goodness. And it hit me. There seems to be a trend that has become quite popular among women. It’s this whole idea of “messy” perfectionism.


Influencers create videos on how to achieve the perfect messy bun, how to master the undone look, how to get beach waves and apply makeup so you don’t look like you’re wearing makeup. How to display those perfect blueberry muffins, with just the right amount of crumbs sprinkled across your countertop and how to properly place your cozy fall throws so that they look perfectly messy.


Everything everywhere is perfectly messy.


Influencers have turned us into imitators.


Scroll through any social media feed and you will start to see trends that all look the same. Uniqueness is obsolete.
We’re trying to achieve a look that isn’t real. A facade of messy prettiness and a perfect “lived in” home. In one way or another, we all want to be like someone else.


And this reminds me of God’s words in Titus 2:13 & 14.


God wants us to be peculiar.
Not imitators but special, different, unusual people belonging exclusively to God through Jesus. He doesn’t ask us to be perfect. He doesn’t ask us to pretend to be something we are not. He simply desires us to be His. His child. Perfectly messy and all. There is no creating, achieving or mastering characteristics that deem us loved in His sight. We can’t imitate Christianity. God knows us inside and out. He knows and He loves us “as is”. He doesn’t want some fake version of you, He just wants you. That’s it. Mess and all. When we ask Jesus to save us from our sins, God looks at us and sees the sacrifice of His perfect Son because in the asking, Jesus takes all our sin upon Himself and cleanses us from all unrighteousness.


When God speaks of being peculiar, He’s not talking about a fake imitation of outward characteristics, He’s talking about your inner heart shining through. Christ in you.
Perfectly peculiar.


So, how can we be perfectly peculiar despite our messy lives?
Here’s a few things I’ve come up with.


Be real.
Share struggles, heartaches and real life moments with others. We all go through them. Jesus Himself became flesh for us. He dealt with sadness, anger, fatigue and heartache. He never tried to pretend that He didn’t. He was real among us. Too often we try to appear as if we have it all together, despite the inner struggles we might be dealing with. We try to imitate those who influence us.
Maybe it’s time for influencers to be real and share their struggles.
Personally I know that when I am struggling, it helps to know that others I look up to have struggles of their own. You can help someone out of a lonely, sometimes desperate situation just by being real. Some of us have too many messy bun days…and not in a good way. We need that encouragement from others that we are not alone.


Be real.
Share Hope. Don’t complain about your struggles on the bad days but forget to praise God on the good days. Tell others how He delivered you, how He has come through for you again and again. Share the knowledge that even though your life might be incredibly messy, God is in the middle of that mess with you. Share His light and love. You become peculiar to others when you share the hope that even though you have your own dark days and personal struggles, you know God’s promises are truth. When the hard, overwhelming days hit, you crawl under those promises like a warm, cozy blanket. And in that moment of peculiar faith, you feel His comfort and immeasurable peace wrap around your tired, overwhelmed, anxious soul.


I struggle with this. I want to look like “her” with her cute messy bun and perfect makeup. I want my home to look like “that” with its perfectly messy, yet cozy, warm interiors. I want to be that girl who has her life all together, living for Jesus and sharing Him on her perfect Instagram account. But I’m not. And I shouldn’t be trying so hard to be.


I should be me. God in me. Peculiar, unusual, loved beyond measure, forgiven and redeemed, shining from the inside out~
All because of His influence on my life.


An imitator of the only perfect One.
Jesus who was real among us.
Jesus who died for messy me.
Peculiar me because of my perfect Redeemer.




That’s the real I want to be.