Sunday was the day to get dressed up. My family went to church regularly and I usually wore a dress. It was then that Momma would always tell me how pretty I looked. As a three or four year old I already had a concept of pretty – it was blonde and blue eyed, like my Barbie dolls. I wasn’t. So I wondered what in the world she thought was pretty. I can remember her catching me with my head propped up on my hands just staring at my face in the mirror. She told me to stop being vain about my looks. I was four, I didn’t even know what vanity was! I was sitting there trying to find something pretty!
I have since grown to find that pretty is more than just blonde and blue eyed. It comes in all shapes and sizes, colors and kinds. I have also discovered that my definition of things isn’t necessarily correct. If I take God at His Word and believe every bit of it, then I must believe deep down what He says about me. I must hold His opinion as fact above every other contradicting message. So His definition of beauty is the one I need to seek.
Do you remember the rather crass guys in high school who would sit and rate every girl that walked by on a scale from one to ten? We had a couple of those at my school. I never got a ten, but I never got a one either. I can remember rushing to class, hearing my score, which I really wasn’t all that interested in, but then hearing the, “wow – that’s a 1 for sure…no that’s a -10.” A girl who struggled with her weight was also on her way to class and she got slammed with their cruelty. What could I say? I slowed my pace and tried to walk with her, but in her hot embarrassment she preferred to walk alone.
There were two sisters who are models. They were drop dead gorgeous. Their mom pushed them to win every pageant. To be beautiful every moment. To be the best at everything. The eldest sister didn’t win the California pageant to go on to the Miss America competition. She was heart broken because now her mother wouldn’t give her the “boob job” she thought she so desperately needed. She only got the work done if she won the pageant. She lost and felt the sting. Her younger sister recently graduated from middle school. When her name was called and she mounted the stairs to walk the platform, her classmates booed. Beautiful girls who felt the sting of missing the “good enough” mark even though they tried in every way possible.
Three girls. Two models, one not. All felt the ugliness of rejection. Somewhere in the middle lies the majority of the average women, average girls, trying to wrap our arms around what it means to be beautiful. Trying to figure out how to get there.
My grandma always told me, “pretty is as pretty does.” Yours ever tell you that? I heard it all the time. So, you work at doing everything good and right, hoping that somehow you will find your pretty place. Well, I don’t know about you, but I never can do enough good things to feel very good about myself. I end up getting myself all worn out in trying and then I spoil my record by being grouchy and tired!
But here’s some good news: beauty isn’t about high school boys’ scoring, pageant judges, grandma’s anecdotes (though there is some truth in it!) or anything else except what the Designer has stated. Get a load of what God says about you, girlfriend:
The king is enthralled by your beauty;
honor him, for he is your lord.
Psalm 45:11 NIV
God didn’t just call out five as you walked passed – no you got a jaw-dropping-perfect-ten! His eyes are glued to you because He is enthralled. Do you not just love that word enthralled? And enthralled by what? Your beauty! That blows my mind because I see this face with its scary morning hair and neither enthralled nor beauty are on the tip of my tongue when I get a glimpse in the mirror! But God has already spoken those words over me, so it is true. And it is true for you. Highlight that one in your Bible. Copy it down and stick it on your bathroom mirror so you can wake up to that amazing truth! Check out these next two verses:
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
Psalm 139:14 NIV
“Woe to the one who quarrels with his Maker —
An earthenware vessel among the vessels of earth!
Will the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you doing?’
Isaiah 45:9 NASU
Apply those Scriptures to those things in your life or about your body that you wish were different. Ask God to help you see yourself as He does.
Personalize this last verse as you read it (it’s my sister’s favorite verse):
You (your name) will also be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD,
And a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
It will no longer be said to you (your name), “Forsaken,”
Nor to your land will it any longer be said, “Desolate”;
But you (your name) will be called, “My delight is in her,”
Isaiah 62:3-4 NASU
You are a crown, glittering, regal and precious, a symbol of beauty, elegance and royalty. No matter what label you wear on your clothes or on your heart, you are a crown of beauty. “No longer will it be said to you, “forsaken”- no longer will anyone call you loser, failure, screw up or name you by any of the past pain that has seemed to define you. But you will have a new name, Delight, because God delights in you! Do you hear that? Take it in. Read it again, highlight it in your Bible. Memorize it! Rest in God as He rejoices over you, His Delight!Devotional excerpt from the Bible Study My Reflection in His Eyes: Seeing Yourself as God Sees You. For more encouraging words on this topic, you can order the study here.
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