The 2018 comedy “I Feel Pretty” follows Renee, an average American woman experiencing life as discriminatory and dissatisfying. In days filled with providing technical support to a beauty brand, trying to find love online, and battling feelings of inferiority, Renee wonders how life might be different if she were “undeniably pretty.” After a violent tumble from her bike at spin class, she wakes up to see herself as wholly beautiful, believing she is unrecognizable even to her closest friends! Her view of herself and her place in the world completely changes–her self-esteem skyrockets as she begins to expect preferential treatment and experience everyday events from an optimistic, privileged perspective. The dramatic change in attitude and resulting behaviors leads to some of her biggest dreams coming true, even though her physical appearance hasn’t actually changed. She lives as though she is beautiful, and that deep conviction makes all the difference.
Part of what I love about this movie is its dramatic and humorous critique on self-perception. So often, we allow our assumptions about ourselves and the world around us to impede intimacy, authenticity, and growth. What we believe to be true about ourselves and the world around us directly fuels our thoughts, attitudes, and behavior. With that in mind, it is critical that we ground ourselves in God’s absolute truth.
Junior year of college, I was coming off the worst year mentally, emotionally, socially, and spiritually, and wondering if I could recover from the damage I had done to myself and those around me during the tumultuous month of my sophomore year. One night as I sat around a living room with my church’s young women’s small group, I dissolved into tears as the youth pastor leading the group knelt praying in front of me with her hands on my knees, thanking God for my “sweet spirit.” I felt so exposed sitting there before my God as she spoke so highly of me, when He and I both knew exactly how unkind, selfish, and thoughtless I had allowed myself to become.
As I listened, thirsting for hope, God placed in my heart the belief that she was describing who He had created me to be. Yes, I had missed months of living into that identity and honoring Him through my life, but God is a God of redemption who desires our constant journeying toward Him. Even though I didn’t automatically feel sweet, even though there were days when I battled shame and despair over the damage I had done, and even though there were still relationships that needed mending, God prompted me to live as though her claim were already true. In the coming months as I began choosing to live in a way that reflected who God has created me to be, my heart was transformed, redeemed, and healed in ways I was afraid to hope for. When I behave as though I’m already the best version of myself, I grow to become closer to that and my life aligns more with God’s will.
This already/not yet thread is woven throughout God’s redemptive story for all of creation. As believers, we are invited into a present reality where He declares us righteous and proceeds to make it so. We are blessed to experience the freedom of being justified and made righteous through Christ’s sacrifice in the precise moment of our salvation, when we accept forgiveness for all our wrongdoing and commit our lives to falling more deeply in love with our Creator and Savior. Still, we are brought into a journey of growth, honoring God as He works in and through us to sanctify us and draw us closer to Himself, aligning our hearts more wholly with His own.
Are we changed by the knowledge that we are declared righteous by the One Who separates right from wrong? What does God say about you that you’re struggling to believe and live by? Would believing that this is our identity, rooted in Him, transform how we live in the world He created?
If we embrace this ultimate truth and the life offered us through Christ, we are freed to live without guilt and obligation. Knowing we don’t have to earn our way into heaven creates an opportunity for us to live with freedom and authenticity, saddened but not doomed by our stumbling, motivated by love rather than fear. When the children of God stand confident in our worth and sure of our standing with Him, we can live bravely and boldly into the story He is writing in each of us.
Personally experiencing the miracle of being declared righteous in spite of ourselves can enable us to view believers and not-yet-believers from God’s perspective. We can love more generously and graciously, believing and affirming His truth about those around us and encouraging them to pursue God’s best for their lives.
When we believe the truth about our identity in Christ–that we are righteous and loved, not of our own accord, but wholly just the same–we are freed and empowered to claim it and live in the freedom He died to offer us. May we live with the freedom of one declared righteous, and the purpose of one called to live accordingly.
“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ…And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.” (Romans 5:1, 2b NIV)
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