Ellie has just been reading my blog and wants me to write
something about her. So what can I tell
you about Ellie. She’s fourteen years
old and turning into a woman before my eyes.
Sometimes the way she does it is absolutely glorious; sometimes it’s more
complicated but she’s getting there. She’s
very clever, she’s good at languages and science, she’s creative and has a
great sense of fun. Her bedroom is full of
things she’s made or altered; at the moment she’s into decorating things with
nail varnish and the results are reminiscent of aboriginal art in their flowing
beauty.
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| Ellie's art |
I think she’s inherited my sense of justice, so she often
gets angry about things that she thinks aren’t fair and I’m pleased about
that. She is developing a finely tuned
sense of what’s right and wrong, and has a deep desire to do good, rather than
evil. She’s working out what that means
for her, and how she can win her inner battles and she’s often very courageous
in how she does that.
My hope for her is that she will be able to grow into a
woman who is confident about her personhood and womanhood. I want her to know deep in her soul that she
is ultimately and inherently valuable and precious; that she is precious because
she is a woman and a human being. I wish
the world would be easier for her as a woman, but I fear that it isn’t. I see the pressure on teenage girls to focus
on their looks, to be attractive in the eyes of men, and to ignore the beauty
of their inner selves and I want to help Ellie to be strong enough to know that
her inside is what matters.
I want her to be someone who is known as just, kind, and
gentle in heart. I pray that she will
know Jesus as her first love, but in the end that’s between her and him. I don’t care what she does for a living, but
I want her to stand on her own two feet and know the worth of hard work, done
well. Most of all I want her to be
loved; she is now, me and her Dad love her to bits, but I want her to love
herself as well.
