My Heart Cries Out for Miley.

My heart has been severely heavy today.  It's been hit with a burden.  It has been crying out in despair.  But this time it's not for myself.  It is not because of my grieving.  It is not about something that has happened to me personally.  It is crying out in despair for a person that I've never even met.  It is crying out for Miley Cyrus.

I did not watch the VMA's, primarily because I do not have cable, and also because I knew I could catch the highlights on youtube the next day (obviously the only highlight I am speaking of is the NSYNC reunion).  However, even though I was not watching I sure felt like a viewer last night.  All of the sudden my twitter feed and facebook exploded with negative, horrible comments about Miley Cyrus and her actions.  I knew whatever she was doing at the time could not be good to get such a sudden combustion of disgust on my social media outlets.  And it instantly made me sad. 

I watched her performance on youtube this morning, and like most of you, sat in disgust as she stumbled around the stage.  However, my reaction was different than a lot of people's.  My reaction was utter hurt and sadness for this girl. (It is true that I can be overly sensitive...but this was different.)  For this child of God that has decided that acting completely out of control is the only way she can get attention.  For this child of God that believes those actions are all she is worth.  For this girl who believes this may be the only way she can receive love, identity and attention.  It is obviously a cry for help and what do we all do?  Judge her.  Judge her and pat ourselves on the back because we don't have these same issues.  We take deep sighs of relief because our brokenness and craziness are not on display for everyone to see.  But - we are still broken.  And most of us (just kidding, all of us) are still crazy.  We have to stop doing this, friends.  We have to spread love instead of hate.  I am not saying that what Miley did wasn't crazy and messed up.  It so was.  But instead of bashing her, we need to embrace her.  Don't misread me - I do not mean embrace her actions, but embrace her as a person, as a child of God.  Look her in the face and tell her that it doesn't have to be this way.  I know that sounds weird because how many of us will actually talk to a celebrity face-to-face, but you catch my drift.

I sat in a group of women tonight at our community group through church.  A group of women of various backgrounds, ages and marital statuses.  I learn so much when I am around them all.  We talked about the sermon from church yesterday, that spoke of the topic of suffering.  We talked about all the different types of suffering and I shared what had been on my heart about this whole Miley thing.  Miley is clearly suffering.  She is suffering something fierce and she is clearly not handling it well.  But she's handling it the way she feels like she needs to.  I am so glad that the Lord led me to share my heart because it helped stem a beautiful discussion of encouragement and support as one of the women shared what is going on with HER heart, about her worries for her own daughter.  Her daughter is doing nothing as extreme as Miley by any means, but she's still going through some things. I am so glad she felt led to share her concerns as it gave us the opportunity to pray for her and lift her up to our God who is sovereign over EVERYTHING.

Friends we have no idea what people are going through.  We must stop being so cruel and judgmental.  We live in this crazy day of technology where a single tweet or post can be read MILLIONS of times in one minute.  We should use this to spread love and hope.  We must do our best to breathe out and live out the gospel in our lives every single day.  Both on social media and in real life.  We must reach out to the Mileys and the Amanda Bynes' and the Lindsay Lohan's and show them what sincere, Christ-like love can look like.  Otherwise, what in the world are we living for?  I know that the Lord will take these situations and use them for his glory in some way.  That is the only thing I know for certain.