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This is my sink.

This is a smoothie cup my kid drank out of and the dishwasher has tried cleaning it 3 times.

This is a roasting pan full of pork fat that I haven’t cleaned in 3 days.

This is my kitchen counter today.

Pin that.

We pin the things we think are beautiful, lovely and desirous. We put on our profiles the image we want people to have in mind when they think of us. When is the last time facebook asked us what we had on our mind and we said something like “eating as many Doritos as possible while watching trash tv and stalking my highschool sweetheart” or “slapping my neighbor across the face because I can’t stand them” or “getting in my car and never coming home”? We don’t see those kind of posts even if we feel them because we allow people to see in us what we believe sells. Yes, that’s right, sells. We are like products on shelves. We are staged items trying to convince people to buy us. We put our best pictures out there for everyone to see. When is the last time you took a picture of your muffin top or your backside with the cottage cheese factories and tagged yourself for the world to admire? You haven’t. And neither have I. I actually have a rule, it’s more of a joke, but still…. I will not have any pictures of me on facebook that won’t make all my ex- boyfriends regretful. That is becoming almost an impossible task these days. I am going to have to start photoshopping every picture to keep this hideous rule. Or go on a diet and eat lettuce for the rest of my life, make good friends with a plastic surgeon or more feasible, untag every photo that pops up. Or I can age gracefully, become ok with who I am and be just that.

I can sell you who you want to buy. But then I am just a product, an image, a marketing gimmick. I can talk about my kids on honor roll, who are awesome at sports and always get along. But I would be lying. I would be talking about your kids, not my kids. Because your kids (you as in the capital ‘I’ image that people portray)  as it seems always clean their room, eat broccoli, write letters to their grandparents and memorize scripture. I hear so much about your kids that I think I have to sell you mine. We are like walking commercials selling ourselves as “the product”,  just hoping someone will buy us, put us on their shelf and keep us.

We have this mentality in so many arenas of life. If I just dress a certain way, if I just drive a nicer car, if I have funnier stories, if I come across like I don’t care at all, if I know a lot of people, if I say the right things or go to enough parties or show you pictures that intrigue you…. We are just building our profile, so people will friend us and think we are really something, important and worthy and then we might believe it too.

What if we stop all this nonsense? What if we start pinning the truth? What if we pin keeping it real? What if people can’t handle what is real and true and messy about us? Will we no longer be really something, important and found worthy? Will no one buy us and keep us on their shelf?

If I pin this picture of my stove, will you refuse to eat the array of bon appétit that comes wafting out of my kitchen? What if I stop coloring my hair, will you talk about how I have let myself go and feel sorry
for my husband? What if I stop looking strong, will I be too much for you? What if I actually tell you I am sad, will you care? These are the kind of questions, we wonder when we consider pinning truth in our lives. And since we aren’t sure if people will buy us as imperfect as we are, we keep selling, we keep marketing, we keep portraying, we keep imaging. We pin what we want to become so that we might become what we pin.

For this is what the Lord says: Isaiah 52:3 You were sold for nothing, and without money you will be redeemed.

We have been sold. For nothing. Ouch.

We have been selling ourselves as though we are sitting alongside the street with a sign that says “Free”. Please just anyone take this. Take what I am putting out there. We have actually begun to believe that we have to get people to take us and this mentality has created these image sellers pinning and posting perfection. And God says you
might have been sold for nothing, but I will redeem you with what is worth far more than money. My own life. God will redeem us from this kind of slavery to selling an  image by reminding us just how valuable we already are. God will rescue us from having to be perfect and put together by reminding us of His love. The Bible says “while we were still sinners Christ died for us.”That means that when our life choices look like my kitchen, God still sees in us a worth so valuable that He was willing to go to the greatest lengths to remind us just how loved we are. Our value doesn’t come from convincing other people we are great, it comes from a great God reminding us of our value.  By His love- we can begin to believe that we are great despite anything that tries to steal our greatness.

Somehow we need to stop selling ourselves. You are not a product to be bought or sold. Nor are you an image you have to portray. You are a creation of God. He made you. He breathed life into you. He sustains your every breath. You are His child. Regardless of what your kitchen looks like, or your marriage or your social strata or any other mess in your life, you in and of yourself are really something.

You have been made.

You have purpose.

You have destiny.

You are the apple of His eye.

He has paid for you with His whole life because you are worth that much.

Stop trying to convince people you are something. You already are. Pin that.