We use the word "beautiful," and refer to beauty constantly. This morning as I was praying, I was interrupted by a still small voice that said, "I want you to see beauty in the things that I see beauty in." I finished my prayer time by accepting that request which I knew was from Him, and began to go about the day in a pretty usual way. I put in a load of laundry, and was looking through my emails and I was unable to focus as I kept hearing those words in my head.. "What is beautiful to ME? What have you tried to make pretty or attractive, that you KNOW, in my eyes, is not? " Yikes! What's interesting is that I could not answer this right away. You see, selfish human nature makes us want what we want, and when it's not necessarily something that He wants for us, we "dress it up." We justify it and ourselves to make it look like it is His will, or for His purposes, etc. We can get so buried in this, that we don't even see the ungodly, or "ugly" things anymore.
So.. since I seemed to be stuck in a river called "denial" : ) I thought I could use a little help. For me, music so often works as a way to really prepare me to hear from Him. As I sang the song, "I Surrender" (which happened to be right in front of me since it is on the set list for this weekend) I prayed these words.. "Father, pierce my heart.. Open my eyes to see what you have for me." Uh.. yeah, He did. I was totally convicted about my heart, and about the fact that I have dressed up some things in my life to be presentable or attractive that He does not want anything to do with. I think it's so interesting that the first line of the song I just happened to sing this morning was "I'm giving you my HEART.." and that my instinctive prayer was, "Father, pierce my HEART. It says in 1 Samuel 16:7 that the Lord does not look at the things that man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the HEART. In the book of Peter it says that your beauty should not come form outward adornment, such as braided hair, the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight.
I know these verses, and this concept, but I've let my idea of beauty get in the way of His. He desires a soft heart, a quiet and gentle spirit, and in addition to that, I believe He is asking me to be teachable and moldable. To be a better listener.. to take instruction without being defensive, and apply it to my life. God knows my heart (and yours.) We can't disguise the ugliness with outward adornment (lies, a masked smile, flowery words, etc.) I honestly think he would rather us be transparent with our lack of inner beauty than try to fake it. We're really not fooling anyone, especially Him.
"Lord, Let me be a woman of "true beauty." I want to posses the qualities that are beautiful to YOU, even if they are not always considered attractive to this world. Thank you for reminding me that If I want to reflect you, I have to get myself out of the way.- Amen."
