God Spoke Back

On an ordinary day of an ordinary week, I was having one of my routine conversations with, well, ranting at, God. But on this day, it became less than ordinary when He spoke back.

Me: So, God. I have been thinking. Well, actually, I have been wondering...Why did you create me like this?
God: What do you mean?
Me: Oh! You're there! Good. Okay. Well, you know...what I mean.
God: No.
Me: Okay, like for a small example. I have a decent looking face. My nose, my mouth, my eyes are all very nice. But I get these pimples on my face and then they scar. I love my freckles, but there are so few of those. I wish you had given me less pimple-prone skin and more cute freckles. It's hideous. Emily has perfect beautiful skin, why couldn't I have that kind of skin?
God: What? You think it's hid...
Me: Well, now that I think about it, my nose is nice, but then I get that weird line on it from when I rub my nose. And then I get those dirty pores that are horrifyingly visible.
God: Actually, I like that line...
Me: Oh and my eyes, I like the blue. But couldn't you have made them a more shocking and brighter color of blue? My cousin has the most beautifully bright blue eyes. Why couldn't mine look more like hers? Oh, yeah! And not to mention the fact that one of my eyes twitches! What's up with that?! What was the purpose of making one of my eyes spastic?
God: Hey! Now wait, I love...
Me: And my teeth are decent and they are white enough. But my bottom set of teeth have this weird crooked thing going on. It really ruins the overall good look of my teeth. And couldn't you have made them just a bit whiter? Oh yeah, and my tonsils are ridiculously sensitive and oversized, God. Did you make them like that on purpose?
God: Well, I actually s...
Me: And that's just my face. Well, I like my hair; you did a good job on that. But couldn't you have made it straight instead of wavy? I mean, I guess it's neat that I can wear it both ways. But it's just so...blah. You know...not great not bad. Average…bland. My friend Lacey, though, she has gorgeous hair, I could use some curls like that.
God: Well, when I made...
Me: And that's just my head. Good heavens, I mean, goodness gracious. Sorry. Seriously, though. How many girls do I know that can eat whatever they want and not have to worry about gaining weight?
God: To be exact...
Me: Too many, that's how many. It's really not fair. Why couldn't you have built me more like my friend Tara? She is proportionally perfect. I mean, I have feminine hips, but did you have to make extra large? And you made my arms strong, I like that. But did you have to add the jiggle fat underneath?
God: I didn't exact...
Me: And my legs. Oh my legs. Why do my thighs have to be so thick and my ankles so skinny? If You had made the thighs skinny to match the ankles, or the ankles thick to match the thighs, that would be one thing. Not to mention they do this weird inverted Y shape they make if I stand a certain way. So instead of looking normal I look like a giant ice cream cone.
God: I thought...
Me: I mean, I guess I am okay, but I really wish I was beautiful. I don't know, like one of those movie star girls? They are perfect. Why didn't you make me look like one of them and make one of them look like me? Didn't you want me to be happy?
God: ..........
Me: Well? Are you even listening to me? Didn't you want me to be happy?
God: Are you asking me?
Me: Well, yeah.
God: Darci. If I had wanted you to look like those women, don't you think I would have made you that way? How long have you felt like this?
Me: .....
God: Darci. How long have you felt like this.
Me: .....
God: Since as long as you can remember, huh? You have spent well over a decade hating yourself and focusing in on your flaws and thriving on what you could look like!
Me: Well, not the whole....
God: And all that self disgust has done nothing but hold you back from enjoying all the beauty I gave you. And I didn't even spend most of my time on the outside physical beauty when I made you.
Me: But...
God: I focused on your spirit, on your abilities, on your talents. I focused on weaving that passion into your heart and that drive into your head. I spent more time preparing your blessings, which seem very quickly overlooked so many times. So I am not going to apologize for making you the way I decided to make you. I like it!
Me: I didn't say that you should...
God: How long are you going to live this way?
Me: What way?
God: Believing all these lies? The lies you tell yourself; these lies that Satan feeds you, which you gobble up like a starved animal.
Me: No, I do not gob....
God: You do Darci. You do it because you are starving. You refuse to fill that space with my Spirit, and those lies are digested so quickly that you constantly need more. So you become addicted to those thoughts because they are so accessible and self pitying. And before you know it your sanity has become insanity and you no longer know where the line is that you crossed so long ago. Does that sound about right?
Me: Uhm...yeah, I guess.
God: .....
Me: So what should I do?
God: Rebel against the media, Darci! Stop beating yourself into the shape they say you should be. They didn't even create beauty. I did. Who gave them the right to say what and who is more beautiful? I sure didn't. They judge solely the shell of the beauty I created, which is what will waste away in the dirt, it's merely packaging. So I ask you, what expertise do you have to tell me that my creation of you is not beautiful enough? How often to do you see pieces of art jump off the canvas and criticize the artist for how he painted the shading? You love the ocean, and I made that. You think that's "hideous"?
Me: No, sir.
God: Those "movie stars" that you want to look like, they spend hours of their day and days of their week working to look like that. They spend so much time on their shell; they never spend any time on the true beauty I gave them within. Do you have any idea how much of true life they miss out on because they are blindly riding around on the coattails of their "beauty"?
Me: No.
God: Well, they miss a lot of things. A lot of the things I created for them to see, feel and experience. I made their spirits and their hearts, and now the person I made them comes in second to their looks. They are slaves to their vanity.
Me: Oh, c'mon, it sounds horrible when You put it that way, God.
God: Darci. You have been walking down that path, in your mind. You know that right? You have become a slave to those lies - they control you. Is that not horrible?
Me: Well, I will admit it doesn't feel great...but this is what the world has become, it's the world we live in. You can't understand.
God: I can't understand the way the humans I created feel in the world that I made?
Me: Oh.
God: This is not what I made you to be, Darci. I didn't create you as a sheep in the flock that belongs to the shallow vanities of perishable aesthetics. Have you felt the fire I put in your soul? How can you even ignore that fire to give any heed to what the world demands of you anyway?
Me: I have never really heard it put like that before. In all honesty, I do hate what you have made in me; I guess that's why I criticize myself so much. Does that hurt You?
God: More than you will ever experience.
Me: Argh. Did I really say I was hideous?
God: Yes.
Me: You're right. Who am I to say you should have made my skin clearer, and my eyes bluer. I guess sometimes I just don't understand. Like the eye twitch, I just don't see...
God: Darci, Darci, Darci. I gave you that eye thing as a trademark. I put the birthmark on the inside of your arm, but I didn't feel like that was enough to show you. That eye thing is a charm; from me to you. Plus, it makes people laugh, and I love seeing that. And so do you; deep down inside past all those lies, you like it because it makes you feel original.
Me: Yeah I guess it does...wait. How did you know that?
God: You know, you forget every day who you are dealing with here.
Me: So you're telling me that the way I am...was on purpose?
God: Completely, 100% on purpose.
Me: You know, God, I have always felt deep within me... I don't want to spend my life with people around me who like who I am when I am trying so hard to be someone that I'm not, someone you didn't make me.
God: I know, Darci. I don't want you to either.

He didn't talk back for a while, and I tried so much harder to wade past the lies. And then one day when I was jogging, in the burning sun over Omaha, God spoke to me again. For some reason I have the most creative and eye opening thoughts when I am running. My head clears up. I suppose God saw that moment and seized it with His own ingenious creativity. He spoke to me through a song, and this is what He said:

"Why are you looking for love?
Why are you still searching as if I'm not enough?
To where will you go child?
Tell me where will you run?
To where will you run?

Cuz I'll be by your side
wherever you fall
In the dead of night
whenever you call
and please don't fight
these hands that are holding you.
My hands are holding you."

Those two conversations were enough to charm my soul. Be still my heart, because now I am in love and there is no going back.