The best birthday gift ever...Freedom

Last night and early this morning was incredible. Anders and I were sitting on their couch spending some quality time together, waiting for Barbara to pick me up. We were speaking deep things of the heart and sharing the joys one brings to the other when Something happened. Anders reached over and cupped my jaw in his hand and told me that I was beautiful. This happens a lot and I always love hearing it. I smiled and said thank you. A look came into his wonderful eyes that looked akin to pain.
He said, "You just don't know how beautiful you are." I said that I probably didn't. That look was back.
He was all of a sudden saying, "You just don't know! I wish I could tell you what you do to my heart. How can I make you see? I don't know how to tell you how amazingly, captivatingly beautiful you are! I don't know how to tell you. I just don't know what to say!"
Something broke loose inside my heart. It was pride being broken that I didn't know was there, and I finally realized that I was able to believe him! I really, truly, believed that I was beautiful. Not because of what I look like, but because I am. I thought I believed it before, but I had just known it. With my head, with my "doctrine". Anders, guided by the aching heart of God, had set me free from the fetters of pride and brought me into the sweet light of liberty. Fetters I thought I had taken care of almost a year ago. I wept, broken, humbled, and finally accepting who I was created.
Then Barbara came and we stood up to say goodbye and pray together. Sometimes Anders prays for me while looking into my eyes and he did last night. There was something different in his eyes. For the first time I could see that he was not talking to me, even though his eyes were looking deep into my soul. I have always loved listening in while Anders talks to God about me and prays blessing and protection over me. He took authority over my life and rebuked Satan and his works and those eyes got so intense and stern that, if he had been talking to me, I would have been scared.
When Anders paused and smiled at me, my chest felt on fire. A look of wonder came over him and he said, "Oh my gosh! I just felt my heart connect to you!" We couldn't do anything but stand there looking at each other, realizing that we had just fallen in love in a whole new way! I was crying and we were both laughing in the joy that God, the Author of Romance, had plunged our hearts into. It was like God had revealed Himself to us in each other's eyes. It felt like I had been following after God my whole life and He had just turned around and I had seen His eyes for the first time in Anders. Anders said the same thing happened to him!
After we left and arrived at the house, Anders called and we spent 96 minutes figuring out what had just happened. I read Hebrews 11:24-26 to him and said that I thought God had let us peek into the box holding the treasure waiting for us as a reward for spurning the "passing pleasures of sin" and holding out for what God has for us. Discovery after discovery kept blowing us away as God blessed us with them. We were both crying and laughing and having the most amazing worship time.
Here's where the birthday bit comes in. I was telling Anders about realizing the freedom of finally believing my beauty and I looked up at the clock. It was 12:05 am. It was my birthday. I was 21 years old. A woman who now believed in the beauty she has to unveil. Not only that, but if you will page down to a previous entry, you will see that on Dec. 25 at 12:05 am Something Else happened. Exactly 5 months ago we professed our love and now we have fallen into a love deeper than ever before. Isn't the Lord good, amazing, exciting, and just darn cool? He showed to me that night in the joyful eyes of my man the joy Christ has in His bride, the church. He showed me that the overwhelming love of Anders is diddly compared to His love for me. So wild and passionate is the heart of God for His beloved.
Don't you want to know such love? It's possible, my friend. Just let Him in. Just ask Him to save you, to rescue you from the fight you are so tired of fighting on your own. The fight to be enough, to be accepted, to be loved. He loves you unconditionally. Won't you let Him show you how much? You will never be the same. I promise.