Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

Confucius

Beauty….now there is a powerful word. If you ever ask a girl, any age, what they think is beautiful, most remarks will have something to do with being skinny and look like a certain celebrity.  If you ask them if they think themselves to be pretty, most of the time they will say no.  They want this or that changed about themselves. Where do we get that from??

There’s no denying that our media and culture are obsessed with women’s looks. Magazines have weekly features with names like “body watch” that criticize female celebrities for being too heavy or too thin. TV and movie stars showcase unrealistic body types that most girls can’t copy without hurting themselves. Ads tell girls that, with the right beauty products, they can get their hair or makeup just right.

But another big influence on our daughters lies with us.  How many times do we complain that we look too fat today or need to lose a few more pounds?  Do we complain about getting older, or look into the mirror in disgust?  I know as a woman, I am guilty of falling into that complaint trap of “Oh, I just need to lose a few more pounds until I can get into this or that.” Or I need some makeup before we go out to “perk” up my face.   How much of that is my daughters listening to?  All of it.

Sometimes it can be very hard to love yourself especially when you don’t think you are beautiful.  Everywhere you look we are sold the promise that if we are beautiful our lives would be so much better.  That we will make more money, have better status, and have everlasting happiness.  Is it possible that beauty is just an unending lie, just propaganda? Why is it that we are listening to an industry that is fueled by money in order for us to be more pretty?  We need to stop letting someone else tell us what we need to do to be more beautiful.   We need to find the beauty that is already there.

 Everyone has something unique and beautiful about them.

We need to do more of the things that we love, things we are good at, things we enjoy doing.  We need to put that smile on to bring instant beauty to our faces.  We need to stop funding the cosmetics companies with billions of dollars of sales money on cosmetics and beauty treatments, that are unsafe for us. (Take a look at the chemicals in beauty products, not on the labels as it won’t say anything, but do a google search, to see what type of cancer causing agent you are smearing on your faces and maybe your daughters lips everyday.)

Most importantly we need to take a look at what God says about our appearance and re-evaluate ourselves.

The Bible tells us that we need to take a different approach to appearance than fitting into society’s idea of beauty.

What God Finds Important

God doesn’t focus on our outward appearance. It is what’s on the inside that matters most to Him. The Bible tells us that God’s focus is on developing our inner beauty so that it can be reflected in everything we do and what we are.

1 Samuel 16:7 – “The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

 

James 1:23 – “Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror.”

Unfortunately we do live in a superficial world where people do judge on appearance. We would all love to say that we are not in the majority, and that we all look beyond what’s on the outside, but virtually all of us are influenced by appearances.

Yet, we need to keep appearance in perspective. The Bible tells us that it is important to present ourselves as nicely as possible, but God does not call us to go to extremes. It is important that we remain aware of why we do the things we do to look good.

Ask yourself two questions:

Does your focus on your appearance take your eyes off the Lord?
Are you more focused on your weight, clothes, or makeup than you are on God?
If you answered, “Yes,” to either of the questions then you may need to take a closer look at your priorities. The Bible tells us to look closer at our hearts and actions rather than our presentation and appearance.

Colossians 3:17 – “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” (NIV)

 

Proverbs 31:30 – “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting: but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.”(NIV)

Are you this imperfect specimen that the advertising industry says you are or are you beautiful and just don’t know it.