Scrolling through many Instagram accounts and watching countless videos of girls demonstrating how to properly apply makeup. I look through my makeup collection and find that I have the most pathetic assortment of drug store makeup. Most of it is from high school when I was experimenting with purples and browns. Though I seemed to have this stuff I rarely picked it up and used it and I thought well that has to change. There is a wedding coming up and I need make up! Well, a beauty blender, some makeup brushes, some mist spray, an eyebrow pencil and bronzy eye shadow later I came to a very odd realization. First off, why am I buying all this stuff and secondly I don't wear makeup! Then it dawned on me...
This is an attempt to search for beauty in makeup and other outside sources to make me look aesthetically beautiful. Now I am not saying that I think I am ugly but I am saying that I desire to be more beautiful than I already am. I was on this quest for beauty and I didn't even realize it. God truly has a way of showing you your heart in subtle but obvious ways. I used to deal with low self-esteem and depression as a teenager into my young adult years. So you can say I am familiar with those two, we go way back. I wish I can forget where I came from but it's a sweet reminder of what God has saved me from. I can say I am in a better place but you know, those spirits love to show up now and then.
Watching beauty gurus and looking at pretty Instagrams are not a bad thing. Just pay attention to what is happening in your heart while you are indulging. I didn't realize what was planted and growing until God brought it to my attention. Every girl wants to be beautiful to everyone else. If not for everyone else at least for that special somebody. Beauty is something that is sought after by most women through make up, anti-aging products, new ways to look younger faster, and so on and so forth. Beauty has truly become an obsession in our culture and this obsession is most definitely creeping into the church. Women of God are more concerned with their looks then they are with their prayer life. We focus most of our attention on our fancy clothes and expensive wigs than personal bible study. Of course I am not saying that looking your best is sin or a bad thing. What I am trying to address is that this quest for beauty has become an idol that we put before our relationship with God.
Beautiful can be defined as pleasing the senses or mind aesthetically, of a very high standard excellent, delighting the senses or mind, etc.
One thing that I am learning as I walk with Jesus is that his definition of words or concepts are different than ours. The bible says that his ways are not our ways or his thoughts our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9). So his definition of beauty is entirely different than our standard dictionary definition. Even if we have our own ideas of what beauty is, his view of beauty is still different than ours. Throughout the word it is evident to see that God focuses on the inward man, the heart. Worldly beauty just focuses on the outside most of the time. God's standard of beauty goes beyond aesthetics and straight to what matters most.
Let me challenge you with this thought. What if beauty was never about us? What if beauty was all about God? What if the only way a person is beautiful is how much of Jesus they had in their lives? What if Jesus was the standard of beauty? How different would things be?
First of all I was completely challenged by this thought when I read a few articles who were also tackling this perception we have of beauty. It has truly challenged the way I viewed myself and others. There are scriptures that reveal the beauty of God (Psalm 90:17, Psalm 96:6, Isaiah 33:17, Psalm 27:4, Psalm 50:2, Hosea 14:6, Zechariah 9:17). There are also scriptures that express God's holiness as beautiful (1 Chronicles 16:29, Psalm 29:2, Psalm 96:9). Many others that affirm how his beauty made the people of God look beautiful (Isaiah 28:5, Lamentations 2:15, Zechariah 9:16, Ezekiel 16:14-15).
So maybe there is truth to this concept that true beauty only comes from God. Incorruptible beauty comes from God alone. I am on this journey to obtaining this beauty for myself and also encouraging other women to do the same. When it boils down to it none of this life is about us, but it is all about Him! I really want God's beauty all over my life and I want people to see Jesus when they see me. So I am still on this quest for beauty I am just redirecting my search to the creator of beauty himself.
*This is also published on my other blog livefullyy.wordpress.com*
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